


when i taste tequila (baby i still see ya)

by purpletuesdays



Category: Women's Soccer RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-16
Updated: 2021-03-10
Packaged: 2021-03-17 18:08:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 64,885
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29475993
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/purpletuesdays/pseuds/purpletuesdays
Summary: "You’re alright entertainment though,” she shrugs.“Well, that just shows you how little you know me.” She takes a step toward Christen. “You see, I can be far more than ‘alright’ entertainment. Not giving up that easily.”"That's a shame."Tobin takes another step forward. “I thought most women admire persistence.”“Well that showsyouhow littleyouknow me. I’m not most women.”...Or, just another college AU
Relationships: Tobin Heath/Christen Press
Comments: 136
Kudos: 432





	1. when i taste tequila

**Author's Note:**

> Starting writing a college AU for a friend a while ago, and decided to throw it up here for her birthday today! Not sure where I'm going with it after this chapter ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯, but we'll see. It's my first one, so go easy on me please. I'm not a writer at all, just doing it for fun :)

“No, no, no, no, no —” 

“Tobin, shut up. I got this.”

“Yeah sure, dude.”

 _Aaaand there they go,_ Tobin thinks as four of her boxes go tumbling off her smaller, peppier half’s arms and to the floor, her belongings scattering across the dorm lobby. 

_Sigh._

Tobin looks up to meet the eyes of several new students and families who are looking over in the direction of this college move-in massacre, some clearly holding back laughs at the scene, and some, well, clearly not.

_Double sigh._

Just how she wanted to start over at a new school. But I mean, is she really surprised. This WAS Kelley O’Hara after all — never one for a dull moment… and not usually by choice. They don’t call her ‘half-pint dynamite’ for nothing. 

Coming into UNC as a junior transfer, Kelley was the only person Tobin knew. And lucky enough, Kelley also happened to be one of her best friends. When you spend the greater part of four years in a hotel room with the same person, it’s nearly impossible not to get that close. 

Growing up, Tobin always considered herself some sort of a minimalist. Not in the sense that she did not need much material items to live—although an argument could be made for that as well—, but it just really took little for her to find contentment. Throwing herself into new activity after new activity, she found energy in the freedom and in the unfamiliar. Sure, she played basketball, competed in gymnastics tournaments, tried fencing, and even joined the diving team until an unfortunate meet when she misjudged her double back-tuck and collided stomach-first with the pool water (and she hasn’t gone near a diving board since). But really, it was clear in the way she lived her day-to-day life - floating from one friends house to the next, spending her off-days taking road trips to the middle of nowhere, existing in the moment instead of on her phone (her friends would complain about how hard it was to get a hold of her), even down to the way she walked. A “free spirit”, as some might call it. 

Those who _really_ knew her would know that there's more to Tobin than what meets the eye. While she may seem careless, she is indeed careful, calculated. She cautiously expends her energy, but when she does choose to spend it on _something_ that _something_ becomes her whole world. So it comes as no surprise that when Tobin first kicked a soccer ball at age 7, she never looked back. She was never one for the spotlight — she just wanted to play the game and get better everyday. However, rising level meant rising attention, and Tobin received her first call-up to the youth national level at age 13. It was there that she met the one and only, half-pint dynamite, that is Kelley O’Hara. 

They were fast friends. For the entirety of the high school years, where there was Tobin, there was bound to be Kelley not too far behind. Kelley had seen Tobin through the highs and lows of soccer, school, friendships, and family—really everything. At one point or another, Kelley herself became family. Yet while soccer was once her and Kelley’s secluded serenity from life, it soon became nearly every part of their life and future, especially with them both committing to play D1 college soccer at age 14. While they had gone off to different universities — Kelley to UNC Chapel Hill and Tobin to Stanford — their friendship had never wavered, something that Tobin was extremely grateful for.

The only problem with making _something_ your whole world, is that when it gets taken away, you feel completely empty. And when that _something_ is a _someone_ , you grow a void that you just can’t seem to fill. 

So here Tobin was, picking up her move-in personal belongings that Kelley had dropped all over the residence hall floor, just months after Kelley had picked Tobin and six bottles of vodka off of the floor of her California apartment after finding Shirley (her _someone_ ) naked and guilty in her roommate’s bed the day after their two-year anniversary. 

So here Tobin was, with baggage the size of Mount Kilamanjaro, towing behind her a string of pointless one night stands that never quite filled the Shirley-shaped indentation left behind. 

So here Tobin was, moving into her dorm at a new school on the opposite side of the country for preseason.

So here Tobin was, trying to start over. 

_________________________________________________

By the time her and Kelley had gathered everything from the floor and dragged it up six flights of stairs, nearly forty-five minutes had passed. 

Tobin collapsed onto the bed closest to the window with a huff. _Who the hell designs a nine story building with ONLY stairs._

Turning her head in a quick 180, she took in the room that would be her home for the next eight months. 

Bright white walls starkly contrasted the deep gray cement floor. Two twin sized beds were lined up horizontally in succession along the right wall, before a patch of empty space leading up to two adjacent, light-wood desks at the back wall made up of one huge glass window. The previous owners left two dressers sitting within the two sliding-door closets on the left side of the room. 

Tobin let out a sigh at the thought of having to move the dressers out of the closet herself. She squinted as the striped light hit her eyes from where it shined through the shades covering the top half of the window wall, before a thud quickly drew her back to reality. 

“So where’s your stuff?” asked Tobin, curiously turning her head to the side to look at the empty half of the room near the door, as she lies flat on her back on the twin-sized bed closest to the window.

“I moved in yesterday, so all my stuff is already at the house,” Kelley grunts out as she lugs a particularly heavy box toward the desk. “Dude, what is in here, a stack of bricks? Oh god it’s books isn’t it - tell me you didn’t bring your library to school..”

Her friends call it the _portable library_. To Tobin, it was just an escape from her busy reality. 

“It’s just the essentials, Kel.”

“ _Pfft essentials sure_ ” mumbled Kelley under her breath, just loud enough for her best friend to hear.

“Shut up.” Tobin says back as she reaches to her left to grab a pillow and throw it across the room at her best friend. “Reading’s my happy place.” 

“I thought your happy place was three fingers deep into the nameless bimbo from the bar that night,” Kelley rolled her eyes as she opened a bottle of water and took a few glugs. 

Tobin smirked. “Can’t a girl have more than one happy place?”

Kelley choked on her last gulp of water. “Touchê.”

It was no secret that Tobin and Kelley were into women, and some might even call them the ultimate wingwoman duo. On more than one occasion on the road, they had beguiled their way into clubs together. And on more than one occasion, they both left the clubs separately (and neither one of them alone). 

It was never over the top. They just liked to have fun. 

And it was in a club in Southern California after the last night of a National Team Camp during their first year of university that things began to change. Kelley knew it from the first time she saw Tobin look at Shirley. It was in the way her eyes lingered on Shirley’s profile just a second longer than usual. It was in the way Tobin’s hands sat a few inches lower on Shirley’s waist than they did with other girls. And it was no surprise to Kelley when Tobin, for the first time, started coming and leaving the club with the same person — and it wasn’t Kelley. 

As quickly as Shirley sauntered into their lives, she was gone in what seemed ten times faster. 

The last four months had been different. It felt like Tobin was searching for something that was now lost, leaving behind an easily-traced crumb trail of one night stands. The reputation she had gathered in just a few months somehow made girls flaunt themselves at Tobin even harder than they had before. And with her _“natural swagger”_ , as some called it, the baseline was pretty high to begin with. There was just something about her. 

Kelley kept an eye on her, but let Tobin do her thing until that one night. That one night of broken bottles, of crying so hard she spent hours hunched over the toilet. They didn’t speak about it again, but Tobin knew when she was bringing it up, _without_ bringing it up. 

“Kell, it’s fine. I’m fine.”

“All I’m saying is you have garnered quite the reputation, my friend. Even all the way over here, the soccer world is a small one,” Kelley replied gently, knowing this was a touchy subject for her best friend, even if she wouldn’t outright admit it. Tobin doesn’t outright admit _anything_.

Tobin sighed -- she knew this conversation was coming. 

“Well they all know what they’re getting into, I’m not hurting anyone,” Tobin replied semi-defensively. _Doesn’t everyone say college is the time to experiment and sleep around or whatever_. Tobin rolled over to face the window and paused to take a deep breath. _Plus she spent the first two years of college in a serious relationship. Didn’t she deserve a break?_

“You.”

“Me what?”

“You are hurting yourself dingbat.”

Tobin’s sigh this time was nearly a grunt. “Wait woah woah can we backtrack. You aren’t my roommate??”

Kelley rolled her eyes at the abrupt subject change. “Um, no dude. I live in the soccer house with a few of the other juniors on the team.”

“Kel are you kidding me?” Tobin nearly shouts. “You convinced me to transfer this school specifically and live in the dorms, and now instead of you I’m going to have to room with some random slimy creepy bitch—,” she cuts off her speech and rapidly turns around at the sound of a knock on the door they had propped open with a hanger. 

In the door stood a moderately tall, lean girl, arms crossed snug against her abdomen. She wore a tight-fitting, black short-sleeve shirt, and light-wash jean shorts that revealed her toned legs and caramel skin. One of her arms came up to brush some of her dark curls out of her eyes, before moving her large-framed black sunglasses up to her forehead. Tobin's eyes followed her every movement compulsively, as if she moved in slow motion.

“PRESSY!!”, screamed Kelley as she ran full-force into the girl. 

Tobin stared blankly at the two in the doorway as they had their reunion. She raised her eyebrow as she saw Kelley’s hand placement on the girl’s lower waist - _very_ lower waist. When she let her eyes travel back up to the girl’s face, she was surprised to find a pair of piercing green eyes already staring back at her. Almost staring _into_ her. 

“Oh my god Kell, I’m so excited to see you. Why are you here?” said the green-eyed girl, finally breaking eye contact and loosening her grip and instead intertwining one of her hands with Kelley’s hand. 

Tobin let out a breath she didn’t know she was holding in, before coughing to gain their attention. “Uh she’s helping me into my room. Hence why she’s in this room, my room. And we were kinda in the middle of something, if you don’t mind.”

_Shit, that sounded rude._

In all honesty, she was just still not in the greatest mood, and the green-eyed girl’s entrance put an unsettling and all-too familiar feeling deep in her core. 

To her surprise, the girl just chuckles to herself and makes eye contact with Kelley. “Uh, I do mind actually.”

“Well— wait sorry who are you?” asked Tobin as she furrows her eyebrows. Amidst the distracting moment, she had kinda forgotten to process that this girl and Kelley clearly know each other. Maybe even _know_ each other. 

The green-eyed girl drops her bags to the floor near the bed and strolls across the room toward the window bed and holds out her hand toward Tobin. “Christen, your roommate,” she says. “But you can call me ‘slimy creepy bitch.’” she finishes while chucking sarcastically. _Facepalm. Making great first impressions today, aren’t we._

Tobin loses herself for a moment as the girl steps forward and the sun coming through the window reflects off of her green eyes. 

Tobin pinches herself back to the present. She takes the girls’ hand in hers and flashes her characteristic smile. “I’m so sorry, I’m having one of those days. I’m Tobin, and you’ll have to let me make it up to you,” she says back smoothly, placing her other hand on top of their connected hands in sincerity. _Aaand she’s back. Nice one._

They continue to make eye contact as their handshake extends far beyond the acceptable time limit. They eventually break apart as Kelley coughs from the far side of the room. Tobin looked down at her feet dangling off the bed as she felt a rare blush rising up her neck. She raised her right hand to rub the back of her neck — a nervous habit. 

The green-eyed girl’s reaction wasn’t too dissimilar. She raised her head from where it pointed toward the ground and allowed her gaze to settle on Tobin again, revealing an identical blush that had made its way up to her bronze cheeks. Her eyes momentarily followed Tobin’s hand as it traced back and forth across her neck, before bringing her eyes back up to Tobin’s and beginning to speak again as they locked gazes. 

“No need to introduce yourself, I know who you are Tobin.”

Christen turned around and coughed a few times into her elbow before Tobin could process her words. “Excuse me, haven’t played in months, I’m soooo out of shape,” she says as she flashes a sarcastic smile. “I can’t believe we got stuck in the no-elevator building.”

“You don’t look out of shape to me,” Tobin quips. 

Christen turns around at that, smiles, and shakes her head visibly. She sees Kelley shift uncomfortably on the other side of the room.

“I’m sorry again, I really am not usually that rude,” Tobin confesses into the comfortable lull.

“Is that so?”, challenges the green-eyed girl in return. 

Tobin raises an eyebrow. She knows an invitation to banter. “Yeah. What, you don’t believe me?”

“Does it matter what I think?”

Tobin playfully scoffs, feigning offense. “I’ll have you know, I’ve never met a parent who didn’t love me.” 

“I’ll believe it when I see it, Tobin.” 

“Heath.”

“What?”

Tobin leans back, resting her weight on her hands behind her. “My last name. It’s Heath.”

“Like the candy bar?”

“What can I say, I’m sweet,” replies Tobin, flashing an innocent smile.

Christen fully rolls her eyes at that. “Yeah well I’ve yet to see evidence of that, Tobin _Heath_.”

“Well you could,” hummed Tobin, before making eye contact with the girl again. “If you let me buy you coffee sometime.” 

Christen’s mouth hangs open just for a moment, as if she’s surprised by Tobin’s confidence, before erupting into a small grin. “Yeah no need to make it up to me, think I’ll pass,” she states with a smirk, watching as Tobin’s own smirk slightly falters. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see Kelley trying to hold in a laugh from the other side of the room.

Christen turned around in the next moment before Tobin could reply, strutting out the door with a satisfied swing in her step. 

“KELLEY, let’s go!” Tobin hears from the hallway. 

Kelley coughed once again to draw Tobin’s attention from the doorframe, where she had clearly just followed Christen’s ass with her eyes out of the door. “Off limits.”

“What is?” Tobin asks knowingly.

“Chris. She’s off limits from your little happy place parade.”

Tobin studies Kelley’s face curiously, noting the hesitance and nerves that definitely weren’t there before. 

It’s then that Tobin puts it together. Christen is _Chris_ , Kelley’s best friend at UNC, fellow forward, and the girl Kelley never shuts up about. The one she brings up in every conversation. The one she settles for casual with, albeit she wants more. The one Tobin would believe was a made-up fantasy, if it weren’t for social media. 

And _Oh_. 

“Suuure, we’ll see about that,” Tobin chortles in her typical fashion. But her eyes, which were now intently looking at Kelley’s, say differently.

Kelley visibly deflates and gives her a quick look that says _thanks_ , before her face hardens into a pointed smirk. “Didn’t seem like you were gonna have any luck with that anyway,” she sing-songs as she skips out the door after Christen before Tobin has a chance to reply.

Tobin falls back onto the bed again, and lets herself sink into the first silence she’s had since arriving in North Carolina. She love’s Kelley, but being around her is like being caught outside in a rainstorm — incredibly thrilling, oddly comforting, but also exhausting.

She closes her eyes and, for just a moment, allows her mind to wander back toward the green-eyed girl. To the way her dark curls framed her angled jaw. To the way she challenged Tobin. To the way her toned back muscles tensed and relaxed and Kelley moved her hands down — _No_. 

Her eyes shoot back open as she launches into a standing position. She paces over to the window of her sixth floor dorm room, carefully sidestepping the box of books Kelley had been carrying earlier, and looks out over the large green quad surrounded by two other dormitories and two academic buildings made of bright red brick. _Not a person in sight,_ Tobin thinks to herself. _The grass is so green, just a few shades darker than her eyes._

“Nope. You don’t even know her”, she cuts her thoughts off. “You’re a great friend. You’re Tobin.”

“Well hi great friend Tobin, I’m Ashlyn.” Tobin whips around faster than a car racing down the breakdown lane to avoid rush hour traffic, only catching a quick glanceover of the blonde girl standing in the open doorway before falling over the box of books and landing on cement floor with a thud.

 _Major ouch._

Looking up, she sees a long, tattooed arm held out in front of her face. Tobin quickly takes it and is lifted from the floor back to her feet. 

“Thanks man. I’m Tobin,” she breathes out heavily as she stretches her arms out. _Bruised up right before preseason, nice going._

“Yeah, I heard Tumble T” Ashlyn chuckles. “Sorry about that I didn’t mean to scare you. I just wanted to introduce myself when I saw you in here. I live in 602!”

“Wow, day one and I already have a new nickname,” laughs out Tobin.

“As long as you stay on your two feet on the soccer field I think you’ll be okay. And from what I’ve seen from you, I don’t think that’ll be much of a challenge.” 

Tobin looks up and smiles a toothy grin. “Awesome, so you’re on the team too? Sorry, I haven’t met too many people yet.”

“Yup, I’ll be the one yelling at you from the 18! I’m so glad that someone else from the team is in the dorms. I thought I was going to be the only one from our year not in the soccer house.”

“Guess we’ll just have to have our own hangouts without them. Me, you, Christen, and….”

“Ali.”

“Ah, Ali. Is she on the team too?” inquires Tobin.

“Nah, she's a .. friend.. from the lacrosse team.”

“Oh cool that’s awesome. I can’t wait to meet her,” smiles Tobin.

“Yeah, her and Chris are pretty close, too. Have you met Chris yet? She’s awesome.”

Tobin suddenly chokes on air at the mention of Christen. “Ye-yeah, we met.”

“She has that effect on most people,” Ashlyn laughs out heartily, patting Tobin on the back. “C’mon, let’s go grab some food, I’m starving.”

_________________________________________________

Tobin doesn’t get back to the dorm until late that night. She’d gone out to a local mexican restaurant for tacos and margaritas with Ashlyn, and they’d instantly clicked. It almost reminded her of how fast Kelley and her clicked years ago.

They liked all the same things — full days at the beach, surfing til their fingers pruned, soccer _(of course)_ , summer rides in jeep wranglers with the top off, weaving through crowds on campus sidewalks on a skateboard, girls. 

For the first time since she set foot outside the Charlotte airport, Tobin forgot about California for a little while. 

She doesn’t see Kelley or Christen again until a few days later. Christen’s half of the room remained empty, besides the two bags she had dropped off when they met, and Tobin just assumed that she slept over at the soccer house with the rest of the juniors on the team. 

After waking up with a mild hangover from the margaritas, Tobin spent the entirety of the second day unboxing, unpacking, and organzing the dorm room. She didn’t bring much. In fact, all of her clothes fit in the three drawer dresser she lugged out from the closet. On the bright side, that left the closet space open for her larger than average shoe collection. 

Tobin sighed as she removed the stack of pictures from the bottom of her book box. She laid them all out on the desk in front of her one-by-one, but not before taking a moment to reminisce on the captured moments. Pictures of her family — whom she loved more than anything —, of her best friend Alex back in California, of her Stanford team winning the quarter-finals the year prior, of her and Kelley playing pranks in the National team hotels, of the last surfing trip she had taken in Manhattan beach. 

She stopped and sucked in a sharp breath as a picture of Shirley surfaced. Carefully, she traced her index finger along Shirley’s smiling jaw, losing herself for a moment. She held the picture over the trash can, shaking her head to herself. But she didn’t drop it. She couldn’t drop it. Withdrawing her arm, she folded the picture carefully in quarters, placing it under the blue paperweight in the corner of the desk.

“Someday you’ll let go,” she whispers to herself. 

Finally, Tobin scatters all of her training snacks and soccer items across the floor closest to the window. Tobin wasn’t a particularly organized person. She practiced what she called “organized chaos” -- while it looks like a mess to anyone else, she knew exactly where everything was placed. _Hope Christen doesn’t mind._

Then again, Christen still wasn’t back.

Tobin took a few steps to Christen’s desk, upon which she had tossed her phone some four or five hours earlier, deciding to shoot a quick text to Kelley to make sure her roommate was at least okay. Flipping over her phone to unlock it, there are a few messages from her parents, one from Alex, and one from Kelley. She decides she’ll answer everyone else later, quickly clicking on Kelley’s thread, expecting the typical inappropriate comment or joke. 

She wasn’t too far off. There on her phone screen is a smiling selfie of Kelley in front of her bed, where Christen is lying in a bikini that leaves very little to the imagination. Tobin’s breath catches in her throat as she scans the green-eyed girl’s bronze skin and curves. Taking one more deep breath, she looks down to the text below it.

**[Image.]**

**6:16 p.m. Kel: Looking for a third ;) You in?**

**6:17 p.m. Kel: Lol come over, all the juniors are hanging out**

**8:57 p.m. Tobs: What would you do if I said yes ;)**

**8:59 p.m. Kel: gross Toby**

**9:00 p.m. Tobs: don’t call me that**

**9:01 p.m. Kel: Whatever, are you coming or what**

**9:03 p.m. Tobs: haha I think I’m good here. Thanks though**

**9:03 p.m. Kel: Oh come on, I’m here !!**

**9:04 p.m. Tobs: are you trying to make me stay away? you’re doing well, bravo**

**9:06 p.m. Kel: You suck. I bought your favorite beeeeer**

**9:07 p.m. Tobs: I’m tired, I’m just gonna stay here**

**9:10 p.m. Kel: Don’t make me launch the cavalry on you**

**9:16 p.m. Tobs: ….. what does even mean**

There’s a loud knock on her door before she gets an answer. Followed by another. Then another.

“Alright I’m coming, jeez,” Tobin calls out, reaching for the door handle. 

She opens the door to Ashlyn, dressed in black Nike slides, bright red board shorts, and a black muscle tee that shows off her tattoo sleeves. Her dirty blonde hair is down and messy. 

“Get in loser, we’re going to the soccer house,” cheers Ashlyn.

“Bro, you did not just make a mean girls joke.”

“You know I did, let’s go.” Ashlyn pauses, seeing a confused look on Tobin’s face. “Kelley sent me.”

Tobin’s face softens as she chuckles at her best friend’s antics. “Oh, of course she did.” She sighs in defeat. “Guess she wins. Let me just change real quick I’ll be out in a minute.”

Letting the door swing shut behind her, she takes a deep breath. _Here we go._

Jogging over to her dresser, she takes out a pair of black skinny jeans and a white t-shirt and quickly changes into them. After quickly throwing on a pair of red and black Jordans and grabbing her favorite black snapback, she pauses for a moment. 

“It’s going to be okay. Having fun is good. Just smile and —”

“Hey T squared, stop talking to yourself and get your fine ass out here, let’s go!” she hears a muffled voice yell through the door.

“T-squared?” asks Tobin as she opens the door.

“Yeah, for Tumble Tobin, you clutz. Don’t think I forgot about that,” she says as she reaches around Tobin to grab her longboard. “Ready to hit the road?”

With a simple nod and a smile, they’re on their way. 

_________________________________________________

Fifteen minutes later, she’s pulling up to the soccer house on her midnight black longboard, Ashlyn right behind her. Tobin quickly kicks it up to her left hand, taking in the scene in front of her. 

Red solo cups are scattered across the lawn, interspaced with groups of laughing faces sitting out on the grass in front of a porch even more full of people. She can feel the thumping of the bass from the music in her feet from where they stand on the pavement. 

Feeling a hand on her left shoulder, she turns to see Ashlyn now standing next to her. “We can go throw our boards in Morgan’s room, and then I’ll introduce you to some people,” she says as she takes off toward the porch. “Try to keep up T-squared!” she calls, prompting Tobin to jog up behind her.

Entering the house, Tobin smiles to herself as she surveys the room. She doesn’t know what she was expecting when Kelley said the juniors were “hanging out”, but this was not it. But she’s not salty about it. 

She follows Ashlyn down a hallway to the right and to a room at the end of the hall. 

“Here, I’ll throw it over here next to mine,” Ashlyn says as she takes the longboard from Tobin’s hands and places it in the corner.

Just a moment later, they all are tumbling onto the bed in the corner of the room under the weight of a small human. 

“Guys, guys, guys,” they hear from above them. _Kelley._

Ashlyn and Tobin shove the girl off of them and move to sit on the bed, while Kelley quickly drags the chair away from the desk and plops down on it backward, such that her chest is up against the back of the chair, her arms resting on top. 

Tobin chuckles at the ball of energy that just entered the room. “What’s up Kel?”  
“I’m so glad you came Toby. Ash, did you know Toby is the best.”

“Somone’s already drunk,” Ashlyn shoots toward Tobin in a quiet voice. “And to think I thought we were early.”

“Are you really surprised?” Tobin shoots back, and Ashlyn lets out a laugh.

“You know who is also the best,” Kelly continues to ramble. “Chris. She’s also so pretty. And nice. And her tongue — mmm mmh mhmmm,” she finishes in an incomprehensible mumble after Tobin shot off of the bed to cover her mouth with her hand. 

Although the look that Ashlyn is giving her - one of both amusement and pity - tells her that this is not surprise news. 

She keeps her hand there until her best friend’s mumbling dies out, replaced by a warm, wet sensation. “EW, Kelley.” Tobin releases her hand.

Kelley looks up with a devilish grin. “You like it. Anyway, I just came to tell you, Toby, that I’m taking my shot with Chris soon. Life’s too short.”

“Inspiring,” murmured Ashlyn from the bed. 

Kelley shouted goodbye as she took off running out of the room. “I’m back bitches!” they hear shouted from down the hall, prompting both Ashlyn and Tobin to laugh for a moment.

“I mean good for her, I guess,” Tobin shrugs.

Ashlyn lets out a sigh. “It’s a little more complicated than that.”

Before Tobin can ask her what she means, Ashlyn is up and off walking toward the door, prompting Tobin to quickly follow. 

“So what’s the scene tonight?” questions Tobin as they make their way back down the hallway.

“Well all the sports teams are here. It was our turn to host the preseason party. It’s kinda an annual thing,” states Ashlyn distractedly as she receives a head gesture from a dark haired girl on the other side of the room. “Wanna get drinks first?”

“Lead the way,” returns Tobin casually.

Ashlyn drags Tobin by the arm into the kitchen in the back of the first floor, telling her to grab whatever she wants, while she grabs some Whiskey. Tobin strides over to the fridge and searches the shelves with her eyes until they land on a case of Old Milwaukee in the rear of the second shelf. _Thank youuuuu Kelley._

After grabbing a beer, she turns around to see Ashlyn staning in front of a brunette girl who is leaning against the counter. Ashlyns left hand rests on the cabinet next to the girl’s head, her right hand holding a solo cup. She’s talking animatedly, the girl in front of her laughing and hanging onto Ashlyn’s every word. _Cute._

They jump apart as Tobin greets them. 

“Hey T-squared, this is Ali, my roommate and um, friend, on the lacrosse team I was telling you about,” Ashlyn states with a glowing smile and a hand on the small of Ali’s back. 

Tobin gives her an amused look. “Hey, Ali, _friend_ of Ashlyn. I’m Tobin, your neighbor I guess,” she says, emphasizing the word friend knowingly. 

Ashlyn and Ali look at each other quickly and smile. _Double Cute._ Tobin sets a mental reminder to ask her about this later. 

“Nice to meet you Tobin, I’m Ali, as she said,” laughs Ali, before leaning over and whispering something in Ashlyns ear. She gives Tobin a quick wave before skipping out the opposite side of the kitchen. 

Tobin clears her throat, drawing Ashlyn’s attention back from Ali’s disappearing figure, and stares at her in amusement.

“Shut up, I’m working on it. Speaking of, I have to go for a minute and, uh, work on it. I’ll be back okay?” she calls out to Tobin, running out of the kitchen in the same direction as Ali before Tobin even had a chance to respond. 

Tobin sighs, taking in the empty kitchen around her. She tips her head back and takes a long swig of her beer as she leans against the back counter, relishing the tingling sensation as the beer runs down the back of her throat. 

“Enjoying yourself?” she hears from a familiar voice, snapping her back to reality, putting an automatic smile on her face. 

“I am now,” she quickly replies. 

Christen laughs, and Tobin thinks that she wants to make her laugh again. 

“Smooth.”

Tobin takes a moment to take in the girl in front of her, letting her eyes travel up and down her toned figure, down the legs exposed beneath her short jean skirt, up to the collarbones protruding out from her black tube top, and finally settling on the sliver of skin left exposed beneath the bottom of her top. 

She eventually moves her gaze back up to Christen’s eyes, looking away for a moment when she realizes she’s been caught. 

“Would you dare even say it was, sweet?” She slides a few feet down the counter, closer to where the green-eyed girl stands. 

Rolling her eyes, Christen also takes a few steps toward Tobin, until she's standing just in front of her, just a few inches away from leaning her body up against Tobins.

Surprised, Tobin sucks in an audible breath, and the green-eyed girl smirks, leaning further into Tobin’s space, almost in slow motion.

_Shit._

Frozen in place, her eyes travel down her tanned face up close now. She’s so close that she can feel the puffs of Christen’s warm breath against her neck, and it makes her erupt in goosebumps. 

They stand there for a minute. Neither moving anything, minus their wandering eyes. 

For a moment, she thinks she sees Christen’s eyes look down at her lips. But just as quickly, Christen’s body pulls away from hers, dragging with her the bottle of tequila that was sitting behind Tobin on the counter. Tobin lets out a small gasp. 

_Who the hell is this girl?_

She looks up to see Christen sending her a knowing glance, pouring the tequila into two adjacent shotglasses. “What? I wanted the tequila. Here, take one with me.” She hands Tobin a shot glass.

Tobin doesn’t usually go for hard liquor. It reminds her of the long nights she spent crying over what could’ve been. The nights that forced Kelley to drag her off the floor. _Kelley. Christen. Oh no. Okay, this is just being friendly, getting to know my roommate._

She’s barely spoken to this girl. She doesn’t know this girl. But one thing she does know, is that she already can’t resist a single thing she says. “Give it,” she returns. 

They hold their gaze as they slowly lift the shots of tequila to their mouths, breaking it only to toss the drink back. 

Christen makes an adorable pout at the aftertaste that brings a small smile to Tobin’s face. 

They stand next to each other against the counter for a few minutes, neither one of them speaking, letting the liquor set in, and listening to the music radiating from the next room over. Just as the silence is starting to get uncomfortable, Christen interrupts. “Wanna go play pong? I made a bet with Kelley” She glances over at Tobin.

“Um, sure. You trust me on a Kelley bet? I’ve been on the receiving end of her losing dares before.”

Christen giggles at her comment. “I’ll keep an eye on you. Besides, I’ve heard you’re pretty decent with your hands.”

Tobin catches the crafty smile Christen shoots her before turning for the door. She takes off after her, holding back a grin of her own.  
_________________________________________________

For the rest of the night, Christen and Tobin pretty much stick together. They were a hit at the beer pong table, winning six games, and sending Kelley into a competitive rage. After they watched Kelley carry out her losing dare — she had to give a lap dance to a guy on the rowing team —, they decided to head outside for some fresh air. The party had started to die down around 1 a.m., people slowly making their way past where Christen and Tobin sat on the front porch swing, and out into the street. 

There’s something oddly calming about Christen’s presence. Something that finally freed her mind from the Shirley-themed jail cell it had been living in for months. It had been two hours, and the conversation was still flowing easily. It was almost like they skipped the need for small-talk entirely. There was so much more to Christen than what meets the eye. Yet somehow, the more she learned, the more the green-eyed girl became a mystery.

She’s a middle child of three sisters. Her favorite color is the pink-purple color at the top of an early sunset. She grew up in the Los Angeles area, spending time at the same beaches that Tobin traverses in the off-season. Tobin finds herself wondering if they’ve ever unknowingly crossed paths before, wondering what would’ve happened if they’d met years before. Her leg bounces when she’s nervous. She has two dogs—Morena and Khaleesi—that put an extra sparkle in her green eyes. She learned that sometimes Christen feels tremendous pressure to perform on the field, and how Kelley is the only one who has pulled through for her.

Tobin was starting to understand Kelley’s fascination with this woman. 

Tobin was already becoming too familiar with that feeling herself. 

Tobin really needed to get over this.

When she noticed the trickling people started to become less frequent, Tobin looked down at her watch. 

**1:43 a.m.**

_Hmm getting late._

Christen interjected her thoughts. “Press.”

“What?” Tobin said, looking up inquisitively.

“My last name. I never told you what it was.”

“Christen Press,” Tobin whispered to herself, before turning to the girl and speaking louder. “Well _Christen Press_ , you’re very fun to be around, you know that?”

The green-eyed girl smiles and mumbles back at her. “Mhm, and…” she prompts Tobin to continue. 

“And are you gonna finally let me buy you a coffee now?” she questions, sending a wry smile in Christen’s direction. _Just a friendly coffee. Like friend’s have. With friends. Friends._

Christen stands up slowly from the porch swing. “Nope, I think I learned enough about you tonight, _Tobin Heath_. You’re alright entertainment though,” she shrugs.

Tobin stands up next to her, a little surprised at the immediate rejection. “Well, that just shows you how little you know me.” She takes a step toward Christen. “You see, I can be far more than ‘alright’ entertainment. Not giving up that easily.”

“That’s a shame.”

Tobin takes another step forward. “I thought most women admire persistence.”

Christen opens her mouth to respond after a moment, but she’s interrupted by the opening of the house door. Tobin’s eyes are still locked on Christen’s, but out of the corner of her eye, she sees a few soccer girls whom she had met earlier exit the house, including Ashlyn and her _friend_ Ali, alongside some tall, athletic-looking guys. She breaks eye contact to follow one of the guy’s arms as they encircle Christen’s abdomen, followed by a “hey babe”, a kiss on her cheek, and a “let’s go back to my place” whispered just loud enough for Tobin to hear. 

Christen begins taking slow steps backwards toward the lawn, in the direction of the guy and his friends. She pauses for a moment, looking back up to where Tobin is standing with a very phased look on her face, and begins to speak. 

“Well that shows _you_ how little _you_ know me. I’m not most women.”

Tobin can only stare, her eyes following Christen as she runs down the steps and leaps on the back of the guy from the porch. She walks up to the railing of the porch, laughing to herself. _Christen Press_.

She’s interrupted from her staring by Kelley jumping on her own back. 

“So I see you and Pressy get along. I don’t know what to do T. She’s really something,” whines Kelley.

“Yeah, she’s really something,” Tobin replies, eyes still watching the mysterious green-eyed girl’s figure disappear into the darkness down the street.


	2. baby your memory, it only hits me this hard

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's hard to ignore (organic) chemistry.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, thank y'all so much for reading :) Had some unexpected free time during the TX storm this week, so I decided to write another chapter. Angst ensues. Hope you enjoy!

Preseason went just how you’d expect it to. Morning fitness and lift, afternoon technical drills or full-team play, and the occasional night time strategy talk. The routine was nice. It was something to keep her mind occupied and stable, especially after she opened instagram one afternoon to see all of her old teammates reuniting, and Shirley’s hand intertwined with the same one it was _that_ morning. 

Tobin deleted instagram.

Overall, she actually felt pretty good about preseason. Vlatko, their coach, had tried to recruit her just four years ago, so he knew her strengths and weaknesses, and he knew exactly how to exploit them to their best extent. 

As for the team, she fit in seamlessly. To be honest, she was surprised at how fast and easily they welcomed someone from their self-proclaimed rival team. On the field, they quickly built up familiarity with Tobin’s style of play. She’d even found out during the second week of preseason that the whole team had a bet going to see who could meg Tobin before she megged them. Off the field, they brought her everywhere, seemingly fighting for her attention, in a way that made Tobin feel _wanted_ , rather than just _tolerated_. And that felt good. 

As for Christen Press… she'd been living rent-free in Tobin’s mind.

Where was she actually living? Who knows. 

She’s seen Christen around since that night, mostly at practice and games, walking through the dining hall, or making out with her boyfriend in the corner of parties.

Parties now characterized by listening to Kelley complain about just that. 

But Christen’s half of the dorm remained empty. And the multitude of nights Tobin spent during those first few weeks of school, holding her best friend as she cried herself to sleep, made it pretty clear that the green-eyed girl had not been spending her nights at the soccer house.

Tobin noticed Christen’s absence.

But it was a different type of absence than the one staking her heart for the past six months.

Her memories from California felt like a half-empty glass of hot water, slowly boiling away, leaving behind an emptiness approaching in the slowest, most painful manner. 

Christen’s absence felt like the moment at the bar before taking a gulp of a drink you’ve never had before. Desire. Mystery. A glass half-full.

Tobin noticed Christen’s absence. In some ways, she kind of treasured it. 

______________________________

What she didn’t understand was why Christen was always looking at her. 

Once, on the last day of preseason, Tobin called her out for it. 

_“If you keep watching, I might even do a trick,” Tobin whispered next to her shoulder as she jogged by Christen during a scrimmage._

_She expected Christen to shy away or look, well, caught._

_Instead, she saw Christen smile and bite her bottom lip._

_“Go ahead then,” she replied._

_Tobin was next to the sideline, where she quickly grabbed a ball, flicked it up to land on her shoulder, before dropping it back down to a foot hold. She flicked the ball back to the sideline, before accidentally tripping over her own feet._

_And suddenly, there it was again. That laugh she wanted to hear, followed by a “nice going hotshot.”_

_Tobin lifted herself from the grass and wiped her hands on the front of her shorts. “Impressive though, huh.”_

_“Hmm,” Christen pouts as she pretends to think. “6/10, maybe I’ll up it to 7 for the comedic finish.”_

_“Just a 6?”_

_“Or a 7, for the comedic finish,” she teases, holding eye contact._

_Tobin stares back, shaking her head._

_They stay like that for just a minute too long, standing, facing each other._

_She thinks this is her favorite Christen so far — hair up in a tight bun that reveals her sculpted jaw, droplets of sweat going running her neck, decked out in soccer gear, looking strong as ever. She only has a moment to absorb it before Vlatko’s yell echoes across the pitch._

_“YO, PRESS, MORE BALL, LESS TALK, LET’S GO!”_

_Looking over her shoulder, Tobin sees that the ball was on the other half of the field._

_Tobin grits her teeth together. “Oops.”_

_Christen rolls her eyes quickly, hitting Tobin on the shoulder as she starts jogging in the direction of play. “You’re getting me in trouble.”_

_“Something tells me you’re always trouble,” she calls out at Christen’s back, jogging away from her._

_She watches as Christen turns around, continuing to jog backwards. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”_

_Her right arm comes up to rub her forehead as she smiles briefly to herself._

_It quickly dropped when she turned back around to see Kelley staring at her with a look she couldn’t quite place -- some combination of disbelief, frustration, fear._

_Before she could say anything, she saw Morgan shooting her a back pass out of midfield, and off she went down the sideline._

______________________________

It stayed like that — the tone, that is. There was something so compelling about the way Christen outdid her at her own game, leaving her speechless time and time again. 

She shrugged off the explanation when Kelley asked her about it later in the locker room, her eyes focused on the curly-haired girl standing just five feet over her best friend’s shoulder. She couldn’t quite explain it, but every interaction with the girl felt like a bolt of electricity. A shock she craved, but one she knew she couldn’t have.

So Tobin kept her distance -- not in an unnatural way, she just didn’t intentionally seek her out. It was the same way she didn’t seek any girl out (not that she needed to). She knew that this _felt_ different than just any other girl. But she wrapped that in a black box with a pretty red bow and tried to shove it in the back corner of her mind. It wasn’t hard since Christen wasn’t around too much anyway. 

The semester was going by pretty quickly. It’s mid-october, and there’s a slight chill in the air now. Tobin’s been getting busier with each passing week, working to manage her course-load on top of a very demanding soccer season, and making enough time to hang out with her friends. 

Tobin got along with everyone - people just sort of gravitated to her calm demeanor. So she spent weekends going out, meeting different people, and weeknights either with Ashlyn or Kelley. She’d even gotten pretty close with Ashlyn’s _friend_ , Ali. 

Some days, she felt like she didn’t miss California at all.

Today was not one of those days.

She’d slept through her 8:00 a.m. alarm, and her back-up alarm, only having woken up at 8:50 a.m. by Ashlyn knocking aggresively on her door. 

She’s exhausted, but nearly flew out of bed and out the door when she saw the time on her phone.

_You gotta be kidding me._

**8:53 a.m.**

“Dude, are you well?” Ashlyn called out after her as she zoomed past her and down the hallway.

“Late for my 9 am!” she yelled over her shoulder

Ashlyn took a few steps and opened the door to the stairwell. “Ok are we still on for brunch?” 

“Yeah, wanna do the Caf at 10?” Tobin screamed up the stairs as she bolted down flight after flight.

“Sure see you then, T-squared.” Ashlyn yelled. “ _Classic_ ,” she mumbled to herself as she went back to her room.

**8:54 a.m.**

But that was only the start. Tobin lept down the last flight of stairs aggressively, bursting through the stairwell door like a racehorse unleashing from the stable.

She weaved through the people in the dorm lobby like a braid, running full speed at what she thought was a push door. Two moments later, she was laying on the floor with three people leaning over her.

_Two months living here, and you can’t get PUSH VS. PULL._

“I’m okay, no worries.”

**8:55 a.m.**

So now, she’s running across campus, about to be late to class, with a bruised ass. 

Of course her class is on the very opposite side of campus. It was these moments Tobin scolded herself for signing up for a 9 a.m.. 

Initially, she thought it would be a great way to get her classes out of the way early-on. But more times than not, she found herself sulking across campus in exhaustion in the mornings. 

Plus, she’s had to walk-of-shame to this class several times this semester… and that was just not the move.

**8:56 a.m.**

Tobin reached into the side netting of her UNC backpack to snatch out a Chocolate Chip Clif Bar she’d stolen from Kelley at practice the day before. 

She didn’t have time to grab breakfast, of course, so this would unfortunately have to do. 

**8:57 a.m.**

_Coffee stand. Yes I have three minutes, I have time._

Tobin gets in line.

**8:58 a.m.**

_No you don’t Tobin._

Tobin runs out of line.

**8:59 a.m.**

_Ugh, I’m so tired. Why does this always happ–_

She’s pulled out of her thoughts when she crashes into something in front of her, hearing a high pitched “shit” and feeling a hot liquid seeping down her leg. _oh no._

Tobin looks up from her leg to meet the eyes of the girl on the ground in front of her, a pair of green eyes she already memorized. _OH NO._

This was not happening. _Please, let this not be happening_. 

“Oh my god Christen. I’m so sorry I didn’t see you coming. I woke up late then smashed into the door, because I thought it was a push, but it was a pull, and then everyone was standing over me and I was like go away. But then I was like this is your fault Tobin, you should go away. Plus I’m late for my 9 a.m. for like the 10th time and the professor called me out for it last time and I wanted coffee but then I was like Tobin you have two fucking minutes til class and —”

She cut herself off when she looked up to see Christen trying to lift herself up, and quickly moved to help. Threading her arms under Christen’s, she lifted her to her feet. As she pulled her arm from Christen’s waist, she felt an ice cold hand grip her own wrist.

She looked up and opened her mouth to continue her rambling, when Christen quickly interjected.

“Woah Tobin, I’m loving this whole breathless effect I’m having on you but please, breathe,” she laughed out quietly. “I’m kidding,” she followed up after Tobin looked up in a slightly pained manner. “You okay?”

“Yeah, yeah I’m fine, sorry I should be the one asking you that,” replied Tobin. 

She took a deep breath, which quickly got caught in her throat when she saw Christen begin to stumble after trying to put weight on her ankle. 

Tobin recognized the subtle look of panic that quickly took over Christen’s face. She’d felt it herself, when she had tore her ACL during her senior year of high school. It was a look she never wanted to feel again, and she never wanted to see on someone else. 

“Um, yeah, yeah, all good here. Go to class dummy,” she said with a light tone, removing her arm and beginning to drum her fingers on her other wrist. 

Tobin glanced down at her watch. 

**9:04 a.m.**

_Well… guess I’m not gonna make it anyway._

When she looked back up, Christen’s expression hadn’t changed. 

“Hey, why don’t we make a quick stop at the health center, yeah?”

“It’s okay,” she puts on a small smile. “Aren’t you late for class?”

“Yeah, but by the looks of it, you’re down a coffee” Tobin points at the coffee on her own leg, “and I’m still up one offer. Can’t miss my chance, now can I?”

Christen let out a laugh. _There we go._

“Well I don’t think you can buy me one if I can’t actually get to the coffee shop.”

Tobin turned around. “All aboard!”

“Tobin, you’re ridiculous.”

“Just shut up and get on, would you.”

“Tell me to shut up again, and my coffee will land on your head this time.”

“Is Christen Press _actually_ letting me buy her a coffee?” Tobin asked as Christen hopped on.

“Okay, now _you_ shut up. Let’s go.”

______________________________

Fifteen minutes later, Tobin trudged up to the health center, Christen hanging on tightly to her back, with a new coffee in her hands.

Tobin felt absolutely horrible. But she would be lying if she said she wasn’t enjoying the feeling of Christen on her back, arms around her neck. 

Tobin pushed that thought aside for now. 

Christen reached farther over Tobin’s shoulder to pull open the door to the clinic. “You see Tobin,” she points at the four capital letters plastered across the center of the glass door. “This means _pull_.”

Tobin groans, stepping through the door and walking up to the front desk. She’s about to start speaking to the nurse at the desk, but pauses when she sees the nurse break into a bright smile.

“Christen! So good to see you, honey.” The nurse seems to just then process that Christen was being carried in by another person. “What happened, are you alright?”

“Just a little clumsy, you know me Nancy,” she says sweetly. 

Nancy gives Christen a sympathetic smile. “Follow me, I’ll get you in a room right now, dear.”

Tobin takes that as her cue to follow the nurse around the desk and down a long white hallway to the very last room. Nancy promises to send the doctor in as soon as she can, but warns that the wait might be up to 40 minutes.

Turning around, Tobin lowers Christen onto the bed. She spins back around slowly to face Christen, who is sitting, legs spread widely, weight on her hands behind her, head looking out the window to the right. Her breathing quickens slightly when she realizes she’s standing _between_ Christen’s legs, but she quickly regains her composure. 

Hesitantly, she places her hands on Christen’s legs, just above her knees, prompting the green-eyed girl to quickly turn her head to look at Tobin, swallowing visibly.

“I’m really sorry,” Tobin said sincerely.

Christen shifts her weight to her left arm behind her. She lifts her right hand and hooks it around Tobin’s left arm, above her hand that is resting on her knee. She runs her hand from the elbow, to the wrist drawing it forward until it is resting on Tobin’s hand.

“I appreciate the apology, but honestly I wasn’t paying attention either,” she softly smiles. “Hopefully it's nothing.”

Christen squeezes Tobin’s hand lightly before shoving her toward the seat just a few feet in front of her, still smiling.

_This feels … okay change the subject Tobin._

“So, you know Nancy?” _Nice, 10/10, well done._

“Um, yeah I actually volunteer in the building next-door at the Whitakers free clinic on Saturdays. Nancy’s shift overlaps with mine.”

“Ah, so that's where Christen Press spends her weekends.”

“Guess the secrets out,” she laughs. 

“Guess so,” Tobin smiles.

“Guess I’m kinda lame that way.”

“Guess you’re more cool than I thought.”

“You think I’m cool?”

“Guess my secrets out too.”

“Guess we’re even.”

Tobin crossed her right leg over her left leg and leaned back in the chair. 

“Tell me more about the clinic. I actually used to volunteer at a similar one back in Cali. I was thinking of maybe starting it up here again.”

They spend the next forty-five minutes going back and forth, sharing stories about some of their experiences in the clinic. Tobin relishes in the way Christen’s eyes light up with such passion when she’s talking about the clinic, her mind seemingly having wandered completely from the injury.

Tobin finds herself a little dissapointed when a doctor pops his head in, saying he’ll be in to see Christen in just a few minutes.

She looks down at her watch.

**10:04 a.m.**

_I’m late again, shit._

Christen seems to pick up on Tobin checking the time.

“Go, it’s okay.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah yeah, you’ve done enough for me today.”

Tobin suddenly feels guilty, looking down at Christen’s now-swollen ankle.

“Again, I’m so sorry Christen.”

“No, I just meant thank you for staying with me,” Christen confesses with a shy smile.

“Anytime,” Tobin says. And somewhere deep within her, she knows she actually means it. She wonders if Christen knows too. Again, she pushes that to the back of her mind.

They stare at each other for just a moment, breaking eye contact when a knock on the door rings through the room. Tobin turns to give the green-eyed girl a last, small smile, before saying hello to the doctor as she walks out. 

In the hallway, she reaches down to her pocket and pulls out her phone, revealing several messages from Ashlyn and Kelley.

**9:54 a.m. Ash: I’m at the table in the back.**

**10:01 a.m. Ash: Why did I know you were going to be late lol**

**10:04 a.m. Ash: Kelley’s coming too btw**

**10:05 a.m. Kel: Came to crash your brunch date, and you’re not even here lol**

**10:08 a.m. Ash: I’m ordering for youuuu, so you better still show**

**Oops. She quickly shoots a message back to both of them saying she’s coming.**

**10:09 a.m. Tobs: sorry i got held up**

**10:09 a.m. Tobs: im omw now**

______________________________

Fifteen minutes later, she’s strolling into the Caf, looking for her two friends. It should’ve taken five-or-so minutes to get there, but she still gets lost on campus.

She sighs in relief when she finally spots her friends at a back table. 

They seem to be in some sort of very intense discussion, so Tobin takes the opportunity to slink up behind Kelley and pinch the back of her neck.

Kelley leaps up and smashes into the table, letting out a surprise _yelp_. 

Ashlyn burst out laughing, as did Tobin herself.

“What did I miss?” Tobin asks, smiling mischeviously.

“I hate when you do that,” Kelley responds, rubbing her knees where they had smashed into the table. 

Ashlyn looks over at Tobin, still laughing, and puts her hand on her shoulder. “You see, Kelley thinks that her whole milk cortado is the best ‘coffee’.”

“But that’s not even coffee,” Tobin and Ashlyn say in unison, before bursting out into laughter again. 

Kelley lets out an _ugh_ in frustration. “Black coffee is just glorified lighter fluid.”

Tobin feigns offense. “You just don’t have any taste, right Ashlyn.”

Ashlyn nods seriously. “Mhm.”

“Whatever,” Kelley rolls her eyes. She’s not gonna win this one. “So Tobin, who had you _held up_?”

“Who? Why is it a who?,” asked Ashlyn.

Kelley gave Ashlyn a confident look. “It’s a who. That’s like, Tobin 101.”

“More like who was Tobin _holding_ up,” she heard someone behind her say while laughing.

A blush quickly rose to her cheeks, as she shot her head around to see Ali approaching the table.

“Hey!” Tobin directed at Ali, while standing up. “I feel like I haven’t seen you in a week.” She gives Ali a quick hug, before moving down a seat, leaving the seat next to Ashlyn empty, and sending a quick wink at Ali. 

In the past few weeks, Ashlyn had been particularly busy at night, allowing her and Ali to become much closer. Ali had shared her crush on Ashlyn with Tobin, and unknowingly, Ashlyn had already done so as well. They were both too nervous to actually make a move. She figured they just needed a push in the right direction.

“I know right,” Ali returned. “This exam wave has been _killing_ me. If I never see an Econ demand curve again, it’ll be too soon.”

“Wait can we backtrack,” interrupted Ashlyn. “You have a 9 a.m. before this Tobs, right?”

“Yeah, me and Kel have Bio with Dr. Ellis. I swear, I can’t make it through a single lecture without zoning out for at least half of it. 9 a.m. is too early, man.”

“And yet you’ll still get a bright shiny ‘A’ on your report card. I know you Tobs,” Kelley let out in frustration. “I, on the other hand, go to every single lecture, pay attention, and can’t get above an 85 on the exams.”

Tobin shrugs awkwardly. She wasn’t one to flaunt it, but she was good at school. _Really_ good. She saw it as an enticing challenge, in the same way she saw soccer. 

“First, I’m jealous. Second, that’s _not_ what I meant.” A look of realization swept over Ashlyn’s face, and she began whisper-yelling. “You and Kelley got here separately!”

“You would be correct,” Kelley threw into the conversation. “So who was it? The leggy brunette from last Saturday? OOH NO, I know. It was that spicy ginger from volleyball wasn’t it?”

Ali laughed breathily. “Yeah, if the spicy volleyball ginger was a curly haired, brunette striker with a coffee addiction almost as bad as her addiction to jean skirts. Then yeah, that would be the girl draped over our gal Tobin.”

The whole table went quiet.

_Fuck me._

Both Kelley and Ashlyn were staring blankly at Tobin with straight faces.

Tobin coughs awkwardly. “Um, okay, no one was _draped_ over anyone. I just ran into Christen on the way to 9 a.m. Bio and she needed some help getting to the Health Center, so I missed class. No big deal.”

Kelley’s straight face melted into one of concern. 

“Health Center? Is Chris okay?” Kelley spurts out, clenching her hands nervously on the table. 

Tobin quickly reaches across the table to lay her hands over Kelley’s fists.

“She just twisted her ankle,” Tobin says quietly but sincerely. “She’s fine, don’t worry.”

She feels Kelley’s clenched fists relax underneath her own hands, before Kelley pulls them toward her torso. She pushes her chair back. 

“Um, do you guys mind if I head out? I just want to see if she’s okay.”

“Yeah of course, Kel.” She can see in her best friend's eyes just how deep Kelley is in this thing with Christen.

“Don’t forget your cup of milk!” Tobin calls out to Kelley, who was only a few steps away from the table. It causes a small smile to break out on her face, and Tobin smiles back.

“Enjoy your lighter fluid,” she says back, as she reaches for her cup and drags it with her away from the table. 

With Kelley gone, Tobin decides to swing herself around to the other side of the table. As she’s settling in, Ali gets up to go grab her order from the counter. 

Tobin takes a deep breath, playing with her fingers for a minute.

“ _Tobin_ ,” Ashlyn finally breaks the silence.

“ _Ash_.”

Ashlyn glances over her shoulder quickly, seeing Ali making her way back to the table.

“I’m not blind. Neither is Kelley,” she says seriously, in a way that makes Tobin gulp. "Especially not when it comes to _her_." 

She expects Ashlyn to say more, but they soon merely re-enter the silence, Ashlyn drumming her fingers on the table, and Tobin looking out the window. 

“Who died?” Ali asks, sliding back into her seat. 

Ashlyn looks over at Tobin one last time, before laying her arm across the back of Ali’s chair. 

“No one, just talking about how tired we are. Practices this week have been rough.”

Ali leans back into Ashlyn’s arm, as she makes a pouting face. “Sorry, that sucks. We just started preseason fitness this week, so I kinda feel you there.”

Tobin watches them intently from across the table. Ali and Ashlyn seem to have entered their own world for a moment, and suddenly Tobin feels both like a third-wheel, and like she’s suffocating from the remnants of the previous conversation. So, she decides to head out. 

Pushing back her chair, she flinches at the loud squeak it makes that draws both Ali and Ashlyn’s attention. “Um, I’m gonna head out. I have an orgo quiz later, so I probably should get in some studying.” she says, adding a fake laugh for good measure.

They exchange quick goodbyes, before Tobin is on her way.

_Where to go?_

She doesn’t really have an orgo quiz, but in all honesty, she really should get some work done before practice.

_Library it is._

______________________________

The next week was significantly better.

She still felt a little guilty — Christen hadn’t been to practice in a week, which likely meant it was more than just a little tweak. She hadn’t heard from her though. Christen still hadn’t come back to the dorm, and Tobin hadn’t seen her around campus, or at the big mid-season party they had over the weekend. 

She knew that Christen was okay, however, through Kelley. Her best friend had even _thanked_ Tobin for letting her know Christen was in the Health Center. Apparently she had been “taking care of” Christen all week… whatever that meant. Tobin didn’t want to know. 

Luckily, she had a great distraction — an upcoming organic chemistry exam. 

Over the past few years, Tobin came to realize that most people just assumed she was dumb because she was an excellent athlete, and she was “chill.”

She wasn't dumb. In fact, Tobin was good at school. Even more important, she liked school, too. School was a _something_ she put all her energy into. She liked expanding her brainspace, granting her the ability to teleport from her busy life for a moment. It’s part of the reason she likes to read so much.

Kelley called her “sneaky smart” once in high school, and that just sort of caught on with her other friends and family ever since.

Shirley called her “careless.” She repeatedly cited a ~lack of interest and effort~. Tobin didn’t know what in the world she was talking about. Shirley was her whole world, and she was sure she went out of her way to show it. At the time, Shirley’s comments made her work harder, not just to show her that she cared, but in all aspects of her life — in soccer, with her family, in school.

Tobin didn’t realize how toxic that whole mindset was until recently, and how inaccurate it was. But in some ways she was grateful. It was that mindset that catalyzed her commitment to the pre-med track. 

The interest had actually started in high school, after Tobin spent months with doctors during her ACL repair. Watching as they cared for every part of her case, seeing the dedication and discipline they put into helping get her back on her feet and on the field as soon as possible, inspired Tobin to someday be able to do the same as a Sports Medicine physician. She knew she was a-ways away from it, but the idea of it just kind of set her soul on fire, almost in the same way soccer did. She’d never really told anyone besides Shirley, but sometimes she thought about medicine instead of going pro. Or maybe after? Who knows, Tobin doesn’t think that far in the future — in fact, she makes a point to not do so. She just inhabits the moments. She just knows it’s looking promising. After all, she was three years in, and she nearly has straight A’s. 

It was a nice streak, something she was really proud of, and something of hers that Shirley could never touch (which felt like a rare occurrence right now). 

But this streak was in danger now. From what, exactly? 

Organic. _fucking._ Chemistry.

Tobin was ⅔ through the semester, and she was barely pulling a ‘B.’ She couldn’t quite figure out why. 

In a typical Tobin fashion, the challenge drew her in even deeper, and lately, she had been spending all of her free time in the library. 

So here she was, in the library on a Thursday afternoon, on the tail-end of getting in some practice problems before she headed off to Orgo lecture. 

It’s 1:55 p.m., and she starts to pack up her stuff from the 4th floor study cubby — the one she now swears by — to walk over to her 2:10 p.m. lecture. 

Making her way into the big lecture hall, she passes the professor’s desk and heads up the left staircase, as usual, to the middle of the lecture hall.

Tobin liked the middle. She wasn’t that “eager” student in the front -- she liked to absorb the lecture’s information quietly, not by asking forty questions per lecture, like _some_ people. But she wasn’t a back-sitter either. She liked to pay attention. She was engaged. 

Plopping down in the seat at the end of one of the middle rows with a _humph_ , Tobin reached down to her backpack to pull out her copy of _Anna Karenina_ , hoping to finish the chapter she’s on before class starts.

She’s one of those people who likes to read the same novels over and over again -- this one in particular. Everytime she reads it, she sees something new she didn’t see before. 

Tobin’s quickly drawn from her reading escape by a soft voice speaking above her. 

“Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”

She’s already smiling at the familiar voice, before she even looks up. Still looking at her book, she responds. 

“You read Tolstoy?”

“I’m a Dostoevsky girl myself, but I hit Tolstoy occasionally,” the girl responds.

“It is better to prevent crimes..” Tobin starts.

“...than to punish them,” the voice finishes without hesitation.

“Crime and Punishment,” Tobin starts. “Impressive.”

“Told you, I’m a Dostoevsky girl til the end of time.”

Tobin finally looks up at Christen. 

“And what brings a Dostoevsky girl like yourself into Organic Chemistry class today?”

“Same thing as you, I’m guessing.”

“ _You’re_ in organic chemistry?”

“Yup,” she says with a tight-llipped smile.

 _So she’s smart, too._

Tobin grimaces. “Sorry, I didn’t mean it like that. I just haven’t seen you in this class before.” She looks back down at the book in her lap, closing it carefully, folding down the corner of the page she’s currently on.

_Awkward silence. Good job Tobin._

To make matters worse, Tobin then hears a guy’s voice coming from that same direction. “Hey babe, you forgot your phone.”

“Oh my god you found it!” she then heard Christen reply enthusiastically. “Thanks baby.”

_This is awkward._

Tobin lets out a sigh as they continue to talk right next to her. Then, immediate silence. Tobin looks up to see why they stopped talking, only to see them both looking at her. Him, skeptically. Her, amused. It is then she realized she sighed out loud. 

_Nice going genius._

“Uh, sorry,” she coughs out, before looking down and opening her book again. (She’s not actually reading anything this time). 

_Can class start please? Never thought I’d say that before._

She finally hears them end the short conversation, followed by silence.

_Thankkkk youuuuu._

“So are you gonna move over, or am I going to need to hobble somewhere else?”

_AH._

She looks up to see Christen standing over her, alone now. 

“You’re not gonna go sit with your boyfriend?”

“Do you want me to?” 

Tobin pauses for a moment. “Not really.”

Christen smirks. “Move over, then.”

_Why can’t she just step over my — Oh._

She’s in a walking boot. Tobin hesitates slightly, cringing at the memory from last week, before smiling and jumping down a seat.

Okay, at first Tobin was smiling internally from ear to ear when Christen slid into the seat next to her. But now the 90 minute lecture was ending, and Tobin had written down three molecules. 

She was chilling when the professor started talking about Aldol Condensation reactions, but then 10 minutes in, Christen had moved her right leg to where it was leaning up against Tobin’s left leg. And then five minutes later, she rested her arm on the small divider between them, dropping her pinky and ring finger down to Tobin’s leg. And then Tobin’s brain froze. 

The only thing she could focus on for the rest of the lecture was Christen touching her, rather than getting down the notes she needed for the upcoming exam.

When the professor called out “See you for the exam on Tuesday. Best of luck studying,” she was snapped out of her stupor.

Everyone began packing up quickly around her, and Tobin just looked down to her empty notebook. _Shit._

Christen noticed too. 

“Nice notes,” she laughed. 

Tobin looked over to see Christen had taken meticulous notes, color-coded and everything. She looked back down at her own empty notebook, until a male voice startled her.

“Yikes, did you fall asleep?” 

He laughed. Tobin cursed in her head. 

She put her notebook away quickly, deciding she would deal with this later, and waited for Christen to move out of the row — they were the only two in it. 

She watches as the boy grabs her backpack and swings it over his other shoulder, before picking a giggling Christen up bridal style. 

She watches as Christen smiles at him. 

She watches as he smiles back. 

She hopes they don’t see the look of disgust that Tobin isn’t hiding too well.

_Maybe I could just climb over the seats in front of us and get out that way. Yeah, good plan._

“Sorry, um. Tobin, Brett. Brett, Tobin.”

_Why do I hate this so much._

“Nice to meet you Tobin. I’d shake your hand but…” He gestures to Christen in his arms. 

Tobin forces a laugh and nods her head awkardly. 

Brett starts walking down the stairs, starting to tell Christen some story about football practice earlier that morning. 

She’s surprised when she sees the green-eyed girl once again staring straight at her. She picks up her hand and gives Tobin a small wave. 

Tobin waves back.

Watching her get carried away, Tobin flashes back to the feeling of Christen tight against her back the week before. 

“ _I need a drink_ ,” Tobin mutters to herself.

_______________________________

And a drink Tobin got. And another. And another. 

The next two weeks were very long… and she was ready to let go for a night.

So she drank a little too much.

She drank because Alex hadn’t answered her text in a few days, and she was feeling her California friendships start to slip out of her control.

She drank because she felt her grade in orgo plummeting. 

She drank because she couldn’t get those green eyes out of her mind.

And she drank because she _knew_ Kelley’s blinders were coming off. 

In fact, just earlier that night, she was helping Kelley set up for the party — just the two of them — when Kelley made a single comment. A comment that let Tobin know that Kelley _knew_. 

“Chris asked about you,” she had said, as she wiped the counter with a yellow rag, not even looking up.

“Oh.”

Kelley turned around and stared at Tobin. 

“Yeah, _oh_ ,” she said, before walking past Tobin and out of the room.

She did see Kelley again later that night. 

People had flooded the entire soccer house. The music was loud, and the smell of alcohol was pervasive in the air. 

Tobin was four drinks in, sitting on the table next to the white couch in the corner of the living room, _thinking_.

Her eyes were on a certain dark-haired girl in a jean skirt, who was sitting on a football player's lap on the far side of the room.

She really didn’t mean anything by it. Tobin found that her eyes were often aware of Christen’s presence before her brain knew.

But, her brain found out.

It found out when she looked to her right to grab her beer off of the table, and met the eyes of Kelley, who clearly saw her gawking.

It found out when she saw Kelley whisper something in Ashlyn’s ear.

And it found out when Ashlyn gave her that same dissaproving look from brunch the previous week, before pushing Kelley a little in the other direction. 

Tobin had gotten up to approach them. 

But Ashlyn had stopped her with a hand on the chest.

“Just give her the night Tobin.”

“But I didn’t mean—”

“I believe you T. Just give her the night.”

So that’s how Tobin found herself wandering across the engineering quad well after midnight. After stopping to grab a slice of pizza, she was a little more sober, just sporting a small buzz. 

The engineer quad was a small one, surrounded by three, large, red-brick buildings. Within the grass itself were three huge slabs of rock, one at forty-five degrees, one at ninety degrees, and a flat one at 180 degrees.

The first time she had visited UNC, when helping Kelley move in her freshman year, she and Kelley had been wandering around the campus when they stumbled upon the angled rocks. They quickly found out they could climb up atop the 180 — maybe about 15 feet in the air at its peak. From that day on, it was their unspoken spot. The spot they went to when they were happy, sad, mad, really anything.

Tobin was all of the above.

A few tears escaped her eyes as she made up her way up the backside of 180 rock.

She had considered just going back to her room and sleeping this day off, but she couldn’t deal with the faint possibility that her roommate might be back. She wasn’t ready.

What she hadn’t considered, was that Christen might have known about Kelley’s spot too.

Tobin trips and almost falls off of the rock when she hears a small cry, realizing quickly that she’s not alone up there.

Suddenly, there’s a figure over her. 

“We got to stop meeting like this,” it says in a teasing, again all-too-familiar voice. 

_Are you kidding me._

Tobin wants to be mad. She wants to be frustrated. But then she feels a wet droplet land on her cheek — and she’s sure it’s not her own. 

She does let out a loud “ _UGH_ ,” because how could her night get any worse. 

“I’m fine Christen.”

The girl jumped back a little at the tone of Tobin’s voice. 

“Sorry, I was just making sure you were okay.” She pauses. “I can go.”

She’d never heard that defeated tone from the girl before, and it caught her attention. 

_Fuck._

She hears Christen walking away, dragging her feet as she went. 

_This is how I got here in the first place._

Tobin starts to get up, but then sees that Christen has come back, holding an arm over her torso. She decides to take it and is pulled to a sitting position, Christen squatting next to her. 

“Can I sit?” Christen asks softly. 

“Yeah.”

They sit next to each other with their legs pressed together, hanging off the backside of the 180, blanketed in a comfortable, needed silence, for ten-or-so minutes before either one of them dares to speak. 

“I —” 

“What —”

Both Christen and Tobin let out a small laugh, as they both tried to speak at the same time after the silence, almost as if they read each other’s minds.

Christen wiped a tear from under her left eye and went first.

“What are you doing up here?”

There was a pregnant pause. 

Tobin knows exactly why she’s up here. But she’s not sure what to say. She’s not even sure they qualify as friends.

“I’m just overwhelmed,” she settles on. “You?”

“Um.” Christen hesitates, looking over at Tobin, before audibly mumbling “ _Fuck it_ ”, and looking straight in front of her.

“Six months ago, my biggest fear was that the other shoe would drop. Everything was so perfect that I literally couldn’t believe it.”

Her eyes water slightly. 

“Now, I feel like my life is 100 pieces from different puzzles. They just don’t quite fit together. And I don’t know when it happened, when it got to this point. I just feel so… confused?”

The green-eyed girl looked up to the sky and took a breath. 

“Brett is mad at me because I _‘don’t show that I care.’_ And I do care about him, I really do. But a part of me deep down felt almost.. I don’t know… relieved,” she shook her head perceptibly, “when he said that knowing I liked girls made me hotter, that they didn’t ‘count’ as cheating for me. I know that’s shitty. I know.”

She looks over at Tobin now. “I didn’t mean for it to become _something_ to her.”

Tobin didn’t need her to speak any more to understand what she was saying. 

“And, um,” she continues, her voice starting to waiver. She pauses, almost as if she’s not sure she wants to disclose anything else. “My Mom is sick. I went over to Kelley’s tonight after the party. I know I shouldn’t have, but Brett wouldn’t pick up his phone and I just needed someone,” she ends in a whisper. 

Again, Tobin didn’t need her to continue any more to understand what she was saying.

Hesitantly, Tobin reaches over to give Christen’s hand a brief squeeze.

She looks her straight in the eye, with a small, sincere smile. “I’m sorry about your Mom, Christen.” 

They descend into an awkward silence once again, and Tobin has to get something off of her chest.

“I know this is none of my business, but how did you and Kelley…” she trails off.

Tobin had heard the story from Kelley — many times. She just wanted to hear Christen’s take. She _needed_ to hear Christen’s take.

Christen nods in understanding, wiping the tear from her eye, laughing a little, and begins to explain how her and Kelley's _fling_ \- if you could even call it that - happened. 

After she’s finished, Tobin sighs, realizing that, really, they’re both at the rock _because_ of her best friend.

“I don’t think I’ve ever heard you talk this much,” Tobin chuckles.

Christen rolls her eyes. “Whatever. I just poured out my soul, are you not gonna tell me what “overwhelmed” really means?”

Tobin sighs again. “I’m scared I’m going to fail Orgo. School’s always been something I’m really good at, and suddenly I just.. I don’t know.. can’t keep up. It’s stupid, I just put a lot of presure on myself.” 

She stops for a moment, before looking away from the rock. “And some Kelley stuff too.”

Christen, who is staring straight ahead, slides her hand into Tobin’s. Tobin looks over at her when she doesn’t feel Christen tear her hand away.

Christen shakes her head as if to say please don’t say anything.

They stay like that for a moment, before Christen speaks again.

“Give me your phone.”

“Why?”

“Just give it.”

“Okay.”

She hands her phone over to Christen, looking over her shoulder as she puts her number in, under _Chris_. 

Christen places the phone back in Tobin’s palm. “I have a 94 in Orgo. I’ll help you.”

“You really don’t have to, Chris.”

Christen smiles at the nickname. “It’s okay, I don’t mind.”

“You have a lot going on, and you didn’t even mention how I like murdered your ankle, don’t feel like you have to —”

She’s cut off by Christen’s finger smacked against her lips.

“Tobin, I want to.”

She slowly withdraws her finger.

“You talk a lot,” she teases. 

Tobin laughs, wiping a tear from her right cheek, before pushing herself up to her feet.

She grabs Christen’s hand and pulls her up, too.

“Wait,” she says curiously. “How did you even come here?”

Christen shrugs smugly, starting to hobble to the front side of the rock, pulling Tobin closely behind her. 

“That’s what she said.”

Tobin rolls her eyes. “ _Wise-ass_ ”, she mumbles.

_Maybe we could be friends._

Making their way to the front of the rock, Tobin makes sure that she doesn’t trip with her walking boot, with one hand in Christen's hand, and the other ghosting over Christen’s left hip.

They’re laughing softly and talking about how they’re going to get Christen down, when Tobin finally sees her.

Tobin goes white in the face. 

It takes Christen a moment longer, turning and nudging Tobin to ask what’s wrong, before she follows Tobin’s gaze off the front of the rock.

There stands Kelley, jaw open, tears visibly streaming down her face.


	3. sky high in colorado, lips pressed against the bottle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> pull me closer, push me further

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bare with me, we’re almost through this angst wave! Got T&C started, as requested :) And let me know if there’s anything you want to see (I’m sort of writing as I go, very open to input). 
> 
> Again, thank you so very much for reading, hope you like it:)!

_ The universe must hate me _ .

Tobin only has a moment to contemplate her unfortunate existential existence before she’s practically leaping off the fifteen-foot high rock, running after Kelly who is already walking in the opposite direction. 

“Kelley wait!” Tobin says, finally catching to her best friend and grabbing her arm.

Kelley rips her arm away from Tobin, but stops walking. She faces away from Tobin for a moment before turning around, eyes wet and red.

“Kelley —”

“Can you believe I came over here to find you, because  _ I  _ felt bad. Because you’d  _ never _ do that to me, not when you know how I feel about her, not after Shirley.”

_ Low blow.  _

“Kel, can you stop talking for a moment let me explain?”

“Sure Tobs, I’d like to see you dig yourself out of the Grand Canyon of a hole you’re standing in right now,” she practically scoffs.

Tobin visibly shrivels at the cruel sarcasm dripping off her friend’s words. 

“I didn’t even know she was going to be up there. Guess you showed us both the secret rock.” She puts on a sad smile. “We were just talking.” 

She’s expressing a calm exterior, although inside, her nerves are exponentially rising at the lack of change in her best friend’s face. 

“Do you think I’m  _ stupid _ , Tobs?” Kelley whines out. “I’ve seen the way you look at each other, how you’re always touching each other at practice...”

“Because we’re friends,” she says plainly, getting mildly frustrated at Kelley’s one-track mindset. “We’re just friends. You know me, Kel.”

Kelley looks straight at her for a moment, and Tobin isn’t sure whether to be relieved or terrified.

“But you want to be more…” Kelley says carefully, articulating each word, studying Tobin’s face as she says it.

_ Just say no. _

Tobin hesitates for just a moment too long. 

_ I can’t lie to her _ . 

“You know Tobin,” Kelley says quietly, voice laced in disbelief, “I think maybe I don’t know you at all.”

A single tear escapes Tobin’s wet eyes.

“This is stupid, Kel,” she exasperates. “You know that’s not true.”

“You know, the funny thing is that I’ve known for awhile. People talk, Tobs.” her voice raises just a bit. She stares straight into Tobin’s eyes as she continues. “I should’ve heard it from you.”

“Known what, Kelley?!” Tobin blurts in frustration, not even caring that her voice cracks. “There’s nothing  _ to _ know!”

Kelley just stares at her with a raised eyebrow, so Tobin continues.

“I didn’t wish for this, alright, I wished for Shirley.”

The deprecating laugh that escapes her best friend’s mouth makes Tobin recoil inside. 

“Yeah, you did. And I watched you watch  _ this  _ happen,” Kelley sighs out, raising her head to her forehead and closing her eyes for a moment. “Now I’m watching you repeat history.”

“You’re so dramatic. I’ve been staying away, Kel. That doesn’t mean me and her can’t just be friends.”

“But you like her,” Kelley flatly returns. “And she likes you.”

Tobin doesn’t know what to say. It was said as a statement, much more than a question. 

And she knows that Kelley is right. 

And she knows that Kelley knows that Kelley is right. 

Before she can think of a response, she grass rustles behind them, and then a voice speaks out loudly.

“Kel, don’t take this out on her, this is my fault.”

Tobin closes her eyes for a moment and takes a deep breath. 

_ Can the universe cut me some slack? How did she even get down? _

“Chris, just don’t,” she states, not bothering to turn around, but her voice clearly wavering.

Kelley looks at Tobin one more time before walking past her toward Christen. 

“Look, Kel, I need you to listen to me. Okay?” Christen says quietly, clearly intending for only Kelley to hear. She was a little too loud for that. “I shouldn’t have come over tonight, and I’m sorry for that, but I meant what I said.”

“You can’t say that to someone and then say it doesn’t mean anything!” Kelley whisper-screams.

Tobin quickly realizes that she’s standing five feet away from a clearly unfinished argument -- one that sounds eerily like the conversation she had with Shirley a little over six months ago, and one that she probably shouldn’t be listening to. 

“Okay, fine. But, it wasn’t meant to be some big romantic thing, and you would know that if —”

“If what?,” Kelley spits. “If I had said yes and stopped you from walking away the first time? As you so kindly pointed out to me at the party earlier -- the party that I threw, mind you, because  _ YOU  _ wanted me to -- I said no, didn’t I?”

“Is it impossible for you to forgive me for finding someone else? I forgave you.” 

“For what?”

“Sleeping with Brett last year.”

Silence.

Tobin is still facing the opposite direction, not yet daring to turn around. 

“And you know what, Chris. I loved you for that. I still love you. But you were just using me, and now you’re going after her to get back at me. It’s what you do.”

Tobin turns around at her mention, to see Kelley pointing at her. 

“Don’t drag me into whatever this is.” She motions between Kelley and Christen with her hands. “I was just being a friend to Christen, because she needed someone, and she clearly doesn’t have you.”

It was a little harsh. A tad bit overdramatic. Probably overstepping. Very likely untrue. 

Then again, so was this entire situation. 

Kelley looks up at the sky, wipes her eyes, then starts taking steps backward. “You know what, you two can have each other. I just -- I need some space.”

Neither Christen nor Tobin moved for a minute as Kelley walks away. 

_ What just happened. _

Finally, Christen breaks the silence. “I’m so sorry, this is all my fault, I can go talk to her.”

“I think we  _ all _ did enough talking for the night.” She sighs at the bite behind her words, watching as Christen nods silently, looking in the other direction.

She internally curses herself.

“Sorry. Uh, we can go back to the room?” she directs her question at Christen.

“You don’t mind if I come with you?”

“It’s your room too,” Tobin adds calmly.

“Oh, yeah, right.”

_ I hate how sad she sounds. _

Quiet consumes them once again.

“Of course it’s your room.” A small, close-lipped smile, falls onto Tobin’s face, as she waslks over to flick the side of Christen’s head. “What, losing brain cells from all that yelling?”

Christen smiles sadly at Tobin’s attempt to lighten the mood. “You got a big mouth, Heath.”

They set off for the dorm room, leaving a good three feet of space between them the entire way there. 

________________________________________

  
  


Tobin doesn’t sleep much that night. Kelley’s words run over and over inside her head like a broken record.

She hears Christen tossing and turning all night, and she’s not really surprised that the girl wasn’t able to get any sleep either.

It’s not until about 6 a.m. when the exhaustion finally wins Tobin over. Much to her displeasure, she only gets about two hours of sleep before waking up to light streaming in from the window where she had forgotten to pull down the shades in the wake of everything that happened the night before.

Groaning, she rolls over, away from the window, to bury her face in her pillow. In the process, her eyes scan over the bed closest to the door. The now  _ empty _ bed, closest to the door.  _ Sigh _ .

That was only the first of my many sleepless nights. 

It was also the first of many new sightings of the green-eyed girl. 

In fact, Christen seemed to be  _ everywhere _ now. 

She’s on the 180 rock whenever Tobin walks by. She’s in line at the coffee stand when Tobin is on the way to 9 a.m. Bio. She’s walking out of the library every time Tobin is walking in. She’s waving at Tobin whenever she sees her. She’s even sleeping in the dorm room a few nights a week (even unpacking a few of her belongings).

Tobin’s not complaining about it. She is, however, wondering what exactly has changed.

She doesn’t ask. They don’t really talk at all after that first night, aside from the occasional “hey” and “how are you.” Guess they both needed a break.

That’s the thing, though. She  _ wants _ to talk to Christen. 

So after two weeks of sleepless nights… after two weeks of avoiding her friends outside of soccer practice, of waking up wondering where Christen goes before 7 a.m. every morning, of daily small talk with Christen, of watching her grades slip up a little, of staring at the new contact burning a hole in her phone, she sends a text message (or two).

**8:01 a.m. [unknown number]: titanic**

**8:01 a.m. [unknown number]: sorry that was a horrible ice breaker**

As soon as she hits send on the second one, she throws her phone across the room and onto the bed as if it were a hot potato. 

_ What. was. THAT.  _

She only has a moment to cringe at herself, before she sees the screen light up. Tobin practically catapults across the room to grab it. She unlocks it as fast as she can, fumbling the wrong passcode a few times in an anxious hurry.

**8:03 a.m. Chris: I would say “who is this”, but there’s only one person lame enough to send that line**

Tobin grins at the screen.

**8:04 a.m. Tobin: you’re texting yourself?**

She’s surprised to see the three little bubbles appear right away.

**8:05 a.m. Chris: If only you could see how hard I’m rolling my eyes right now**

**8:05 a.m. Tobin: hmm well if you were ever in the dorm at the same time as me, maybe we could arrange a viewing party**

**8:06 a.m. Chris: Dorm’s a little mundane**

**8:06 a.m. Chris: How about we do tomorrow at The Bean, after orgo? (but bring the orgo problem set)**

**8:07 a.m. Tobin: sounds good, it’s a date**

**8:08 a.m. Chris: Excuse you, I only agreed to a viewing party**

**8:09 a.m. Tobin: now i’m rolling my eyes**

**8:10 a.m. Chris: I think it’s my turn to buy coffee you anyway**

**8:10 a.m. Tobin: :) try not to spill it all over me this time**

**8:11 a.m. Chris: no promises :)**

**8:12 a.m. Tobin: ugh. ok see you then**

**8:13 a.m. Chris: hahah bye Tobin**

It was like the roles had all utterly reversed, as if it was opposite day every single day now — or some other tragic cosmic reality. Since that day, Tobin and Christen never really stopped talking, and meanwhile, Kelley had ceased speaking to them both. 

And in a way, Kelley’s silence almost hurt more than Shirley ever did. If Tobin had to describe the feeling in words, she’d say it’s like someone took the stake that Shirley stuck in there, and gave it a nice, big twist.

The only thing worse than her best friend wanting nothing to do with her right now, was having  _ everyone  _ pick up on the tension between them.

Tobin could deal with the glares from her best friend, the awkward bus rides to games sitting next to Kelley, carefully staying away from her at parties. 

What she couldn’t deal with was the way in which everyone on the team not-so-subtly went out of their way to keep them away from each other. The way people rapidly volunteered to be their partners during drills at practice, the way someone new decided to tell Kelley their life story during every bus ride to away games. It was torture, like a constant reminder of what she had lost, of how angry she still was at Kelley. 

Even Ashlyn had sort of been giving her the cold shoulder.

But that only lasted a week or two, until Tobin couldn’t take it anymore. Ashlyn was her next closest friend after Kelley, and probably the only person she actually saw more than Kelley. 

So one night, she went over and banged on the door. She banged until Ashlyn finally opened the door. 

_ “Do you need something Tobin?” Ashlyn sighed out. _

_ “Yeah. We need to talk,” Tobin replied.  _

_ She had rehearsed this in her head repeatedly. _

_ “I talked to Kelley.” _

_ Tobin looked at her, with a defeated stare. _

_ “And you didn’t think to ask me, too?” _

After that, Ashlyn had let her in the room. And they talked. They talked for hours, laying flat on their backs in the pitch-black darkness of the dorm room.

_ “I thought she would’ve gotten over this by now.” _

_ “I think you should give it some time,”  _ Ashlyn had said.  _ “There’s clearly a lot of unresolved emotions on both sides. Your friendship is endgame, trust me, we’ve all seen it.” _

________________________________________

  
  


So that’s what Tobin did. She gave it some time. She gave it  _ a lot _ of time.

Meanwhile, she worked to distract herself with school and soccer. It truthfully wasn’t too difficult to do so, given that it was now late-November, and the final exam wave before final exams themselves was approaching rapidly. The big NCAA tournament was coming up, too. In other words, Tobin was training both her mind and body like a crazy woman.

Isn’t college great?

The one thing keeping Tobin going right now, other than the hope of resolving things with Kelley at some point in time, was a certain green-eyed girl.

Outside of school and soccer, Tobin had been spending nearly  _ every _ free moment with Christen. It started with that Orgo tutoring session at The Bean, the local coffee shop, which quickly turned into daily Orgo tutoring sessions, which turned into Orgo tutoring sessions followed by a very long hangout. 

In that time, Tobin’s grade had actually gone up almost a whole letter grade, from a B- to a A-, and she wasn’t sure if it was the actually tutoring, or her newfound motivation to, well, impress Christen. For the first time this year, she actually let herself ponder that question.

Also in that time, they had both learned that hanging out with the soccer team just proved to be an all-around awkward experience….

__ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __

It was the second week of November, and the whole team was going away to stay in a “haunted” Appalachian cabin for a late Hall-o-weekend (they had games the past three weekends since Halloween).

The trip was some sort of big annual tradition, planned by the seniors, for the rest of the team. It involved staying in a huge cabin with 10 bedrooms, right in front of a big lake. Everyone always said it was their favorite part of the season — Kelley had even said that to Tobin, two years running now. 

Tobin had been kind of dreading the whole thing, if she were being honest.

She was knee deep in planning her fake illness escape the morning of the trip, when Christen had literally latched onto her arm and dragged her out to the bus. 

“Tobin, you are  _ not _ leaving me alone on this trip!” she had said. 

It would have been impossible to miss the way everyone’s heads turned toward the pair when they approached, eyes focused on Christen’s hand, which was gripping Tobin’s arm.

The team was all familiar with the tension between the three of them — Tobin, Christen, and Kelley, that is. 

It’s not that people were taking sides, necessarily. Rather, Kelley “half-pint dynamite” O’Hara herself was outspoken, supportive, and knew how to have a good time, all of which easily deemed her one of the most popular girls on the team, and next in-line for captain. Tobin was likeable and easy-going, but she was new, and couldn’t really compete with three years of KO. Not that she was trying. 

The bus ride was three hours, and Tobin’s designated bus buddy, Kelley, spent the ride chatting with everyone but Tobin, per usual. So leaning her head against the window, Tobin pulled out her phone.

**11:37 a.m. Tobs: chrisssss**

She smiles when she sees the three bubbles appear right away. 

**11:38 a.m. Chris: what’s up**

**11:38 a.m. Tobs: sos**

**11:39 a.m. Chris: lol why**

**11:40 a.m. Tobs: I need a doctor**

**11:41 a.m. Chris: ...Are you okay?**

**11:42 a.m. Tobs: no, Kelley has sucked all the sunlight from my row and i now have a severe vitamin D deficiency**

**11:43 a.m. Chris: nerd**

**11:44 a.m. Tobs: chrisss :(**

**11:45 a.m. Chris: you wanna know what I think you have**

**11:46 a.m. Tobs: sure**

**11:47 a.m. Chris: I think you’re suffering from a lack of vitamin me :)**

Tobin rolls her eyes. 

**11:48 a.m. Tobs: you know what, I think you’re right**

**11:49 a.m. Chris: Guess you’ll just have to hangout with me all weekend**

**11:50 a.m. Tobs: I mean if its the only cure, I guess I could suffer through it**

**11:51 a.m. Chris: I hate you**

**11:52 a.m. Tobs: :) no you don’t**

They texted for the rest of the busride, and by the time they arrived at the big cabin, Tobin had nearly forgotten where she was headed to. 

_ Sigh. Reality. _

After grabbing all of their luggage off of the bus, the team made their way into the front of the cabin together, until they were all standing in the front living room. 

The two senior captains, Heather and Yael, jumped up on the bar, and the whole team cheered.

“All right y’all,” yelled Heather. “Welcome to the haunted late Halloweekend cabin!”

“There are 10 rooms, and 20 of us. So everyone find a buddy and fan out,” Yael added. “Heather and I are going to get some booze in town, and we’ll campfire it up later tonight. Have fun.”

In the two minutes following Yael’s speech, six things happened.

1 - At the mention of buddying up, Tobin and Christen both froze where they stood behind everyone else.

2 - Kelley’s eyes met Tobin’s eyes from across the crowd. 

3 - Ashlyn enthusiastically yanked Kelley down the right hallway.

4 - Everyone grabbed their bags, the rest of the team running down the halls to find the best bedrooms.

5 - Tobin and Christen stood there, bags in hand, staring at each other. 

6 - They walked together upstairs in an uncomfortable silence, locating the last available bedroom.

Entering the small room, Tobin takes a nervous gulp when she sees the one, full-size bed in the center, covered in a bright red comforter with orange flowers stitched in.

She breathes a sigh of relief when she sees the similarly red pullout couch on the far side of the room.

The room itself is not large -- maybe 10 x 12, made of chocolate brown logwood. Besides the bed and couch, there are two luggage stands on the far side of the room, alongside the door to a small bathroom, and that’s it.

Tobin huffs loudly, dropping her baby blue UNC duffle bag onto one of the luggage stands, before making her way into the small bathroom to splash some water on her face. 

As she’s drying her face, she turns her body in the direction of the bedroom to speak.

“I can take the couch.”

“Okay I would argue with you, but the bed looks  _ really _ comfy,” she heard Christen call out. “Are you sure though?”

Tobin laughs as she emerges from the bathroom. “Yeah, course. I, for one, am really excited about this couch.”

“I bet you 10 dollars that you aren’t even going to pull the bed part out of it.”

“Guess I owe you 10 dollars then,” Tobin replies while searching through her duffle for a phone charger. “It ruins the entire art of couch sleeping.”

“How about you just get the next round of coffees when we get back?”

“Deal,” she looks up smiling at Christen, who is sprawled out on her stomach across the bed. “But that’ll only cover 5 dollars. So two rounds?”

“Hmm,” Christen exaggeratedly thinks out loud. “One round. And I'll cash in my other request at a later time.”

“You’re infuriating.”

“That’s why you like me.” Christen brings her head to rest on her two hands, smiling sweetly, before changing the subject. “So what do you want to do until later?”

Forgoing an answer, Tobin ran and leaped on the bed, nearly landing on top of Christen. They spent the next three hours lounging on the bed, half on top of each other, passing Christen’s phone back and forth while stalking some people from UNC on instagram. Tobin was having a good time until she was 10 months deep in the profile of an apparently very annoying guy in Christen’s Women’s Studies course this semester, when a fleeting message appeared at the top of the screen. 

**7:27 p.m. Brett <3: haha I’m glad you’re having fun babe **

Tobin had almost forgotten about him. 

_ Time to go? Time to go.  _

She quickly flicks up on the message before abruptly jumping off the bed toward the door, telling Christen they should head down now, and turning toward the door before she can register the girl’s furrowed brow. 

She also misses the sad look Christen throws her after realizing just what it was that made Tobin jump up to leave. 

She doesn’t, however, miss Kelley’s eye roll when her and Christen exit the house together to join the rest of the team at the big fire pit.

For the rest of the night, Tobin feels scrutinized under the eyes of her best friend.  _ Ex-best friend? _ Who knows these days.

Her teammates go around drinking, sharing ghost stories, playing never have I ever, and just chatting amongst themselves. Midway through the night, the temperature had dropped perceptibly, and many teammates had gone inside to grab blankets, including Christen. 

Upon their return, Tobin is about to hop under the last blanket with Christen, but she quickly halts her movement when she meets the eyes of Kelley. She slowly but visibly withdraws her hand before not-so-subtly moving her entire body a few inches farther from Christen on the big loveseat they are sitting on.

“You cold, Tobs?” Christen whispered, leaning closer to Tobin and glancing over her face.

“Uh, nah, kinda hot actually.” Tobin responded, not returning the look.

But Christen didn’t miss the sound of Tobin’s teeth chattering mid-sentence. She didn’t miss the way Tobin moved her body away from her own. She didn’t miss the way Tobin refused to meet her eyes. And she  _ definitely  _ didn’t miss the heated stare between Kelley and Tobin at this moment.

No one else seemed to notice, though.

So yeah, there was a chill in the air, and it was certainly not from  _ just _ the weather.

_ Damn, it’s cold _ , Tobin thought to herself as she shivered. 

“Um, I’m gonna get some air,” Tobin announces to the group of girls she had been chatting with. The girls nod nicely, before merely resuming their debate about who is the hotter Ryan: Ryan  _ Gosling _ or Ryan  _ Reynolds _ . 

Christen grabs her arm before she can get up, looking into Tobin’s eyes.

“Tobin, we’re already outside.”

Tobin doesn’t respond. She just gets up and starts walking into the woods.

Ten minutes later, Tobin is regretting this little ‘walk’ thing. She hadn’t taken her phone outside, so she didn’t even have a flashlight. It was nearly pitch black, the only light around being that of the moonlight shining through the tracks in the trees. 

Luckily, it’s not much longer until her wandering leads her to a break in the trees, and she’s now standing at a secluded dock looking out over the lake. It was nearly 11 p.m., but with the way the moonlight reflected off the water and lit up the dock, it may as well have been dawn. 

Tobin made her way to the end of the dock, removed her socks and sneakers, and sat down, legs dangling off of the dock. 

She only has a few minutes to let the lake absorb her thoughts, to be an ablution for her currently messy reality, before she hears the wood of the dock creak behind her.

_ AH. _

Whipping her head around, Tobin lets out a small yelp at the dark, approaching figure. It’s only when the figure is five feet away that she un-clenches her fists, recognizing the curvy silhouette standing in front of her before it even speaks. 

“Hey Tobs, it’s me,” she hears a soft voice.

“Hi.”

“Can I sit?”

“Yeah,” Tobin replies, the interaction reminding her of that night on the 180 rock. The night when she first got a glimpse inside Christen’s hauntingly beautiful brain, but also the night one of the most important relationships in her life seemingly dissipated. 

Christen sits next to her, legs pressed up against Tobin’s as they hang off of the end of the dock.

After another minute of silence, Christen nudges Tobin’s side with her own shoulders. 

“I’m sorry, you know,” she speaks into the silence. 

Tobin doesn’t ask why. She knows. She doesn’t want to hear her say it out loud. 

So they enter into another silence, before Tobin hears a giggle. Looking over, she sees Christen laughing and her mouth settling into her classic, mischievous grin -- the same one Tobin had received as Christen backed away from the porch swing that first night.

“What’s so funny?” Tobin asks, smiling in awe at the girl next to her.

“Get up! I have an idea.”

Christen gets up herself, before taking Tobin’s hands in hers, and yanking her to her feet. They’re now standing, facing each other at the end of the dock. 

“I think I’m gonna cash in on that request now.”

“Oh yeah?” Tobin responds curiously. “And what may I do for you?”

“Take off your clothes.”

Tobin swears her heart stops beating for just a moment.

She chokes on air, coughing out a “what.”

Christen just smiles at the visible effect she has on the girl in front of her. “You heard me.”

Tobin just stares.

“Fine. I’ll go first,” Christen says as she pulls on the bow of her purple, halter sundress, before letting it slide down her body, and stepping out of it -- maintaining eye contact with Tobin the entire time.

_ She’s not wearing a bra. Oh god.  _

It takes every ounce of willpower Tobin has to resist letting her eyes wander down Christen’s body, now only covered by a thin, black thong.

Instead, she takes a moment to study Christen’s face. She’s memorized these green eyes many times before -- in the dorm during sunset, on a rainy day in the student center, on a sunny day on the 180 rock. But she swears she’s never seen anything as beautiful as Christen’s green eyes in the Appalachian moonlight. 

“Don’t leave me hanging,” Christen teases. “I’m cashing in. We’re going skinny dipping.”

Tobin looks away, off the end of a dock for a moment, laughing as she responds. “No we’re not.”

Christen pouts, and Tobin is finding it harder not to give in. 

“It’s on my junior year bucket list.”

“It’s 40 degrees, Chris! We’re not going skinny dipping.” 

Tobin turns to face off the end of the dock, biting her lip as she feels Christen’s arms wrap around her neck from behind, Christen’s naked chest pressed up against her back, and lips ghosting her ear.

“Pussy.”

Just as she closes her eyes to savor the moment a little longer, Christen is already gone, and Tobin hears a splash in the water in front of her. She panics for a moment, not seeing any water move. But before she can spiral too far, she sees a head break through the surface of the water. 

She stares again. 

“Are you just gonna watch or …” she hears from the water.

Tobin rolls her eyes, biting her lip again as she watches Christen tread water. 

_ This GIRL. _

“Fuck it,” she announces, before pulling down her ripped denim jeans, and simultaneously grabbing the collar of her gray Nirvana t-shirt from the back of the neck and yanking it over her head. She slowly drops the t-shirt on the dock, standing in a pair of black boy-shorts that tightly hug her hips, and a black Nike sports bra. 

She’s about to jump in, when she hears Christen speak again.

“Off.”

Tobin swallows, before nodding and slowly sliding out of her sports bra, letting it fall on the dock beside her. She feels her nipples hardening with the cool night breeze. But Tobin feels scalding hot under Christen’s gaze.

Christen looks confused as Tobin holds up her pointer finger, backing away from the end of the dock, only to start laughing when Tobin bursts into an epic, full-dock sprint, before cannonballing into the water.

“You suck,” Christen giggles, as Tobin emerges, shaking her wet hair out of her eyes, and splashing Christen a few times before beginning to tread water.

“You’re the one who made me get in here!”

“Because you put up such a big fight, Tobs,” she rolls her eyes.

“I did!”

“Not when the dress came off,” Christen quipped back, biting and releasing her lower lip slowly.

_ Oh fuck. _

They stare at each other for a moment, just treading water.

“It was cold out there,” Tobin said quietly, needing to fill the silence. 

“It’s cold in here,” Christen returns in the same tone.

“So come here then.”

Tobin can practically see the wheels turning in the green-eyed girl's mind as she stays in her spot, just watching Tobin’s face. 

Only a moment later, she sees Christen’s head plunge below the water.

_ Weird _ .

Then she feels soft hands tracing up her torso.

And  _ Oh. _

Just a second after, Christen’s face emerges from the water right in front of her own face, her hands moving up over Tobin’s breasts, linking behind her neck. Her bare legs come up to encircle Tobin’s abdomen. 

_ I might just drown _ .

Tobin keeps treading with her arms to keep them afloat, although she’s finding it increasingly difficult to not touch any part of Christen instead.

They stay like that for a few minutes, bare chests pressed together, faces just inches apart, breathing each other in.

_ You’re so beautiful. _

But then she feels Christen’s body tense up. 

_ Tell me I didn’t say that out loud. _

Christen’s staring at her with an intensity she’d never seen before. It’s a look she can’t quite read. Not that she has the chance to, because soon Christen’s pulling away, swimming back toward the dock. 

_ Fuck me. _

Tobin takes off after Christen, pulling herself out of the water alongside the girl, and moving to throw on her clothes. She had felt the tone shift with that one accidental comment, and suddenly she felt a little… bare. 

“Ready to go?” she asks, trying to gage Christen’s mood.

She’s relieved to see Christen’s face erupt in a small grin.

“Yeah, race ya?” Christen calls out, sprinting down the dock.

“That’s not fair” Tobin yells out as she follows behind her. “You know you’re way faster than me!”

When they get back to the yard, shoving each other and laughing as they near the house — the “finish line” — the entire team is still outside by the fire hanging out. 

But this time, when the eyes of several of their teammates look over at the two of them, soaking wet, hands all over each other, Tobin can’t find a reason within herself to care. She thinks Christen can’t either, as they both make quiet eye contact before bursting out laughing all over again and running together past the team and through the sliding glass door into the house, not even bothering to look back at their whispering, staring teammates.

They don’t stop running until they make it to their room, where they proceed to take turns showering and getting ready for bed. Enough socializing with the team for the night, they had decided. 

After they’re all cleaned up and in dry clothes, they find themselves both laying in the dark cabin room. The sounds of their laughing teammates echoes through the window above the couch that Tobin is sprawled across, strong moonlight also shining into the bedroom.

They’ve laid in calm silence before during nights when Christen is in their dorm room. But tonight, the silence is anything but calm. The silence is loud. 

And Tobin’s head feels overwhelmed, yearning to feel Christen’s hands on her body again. 

But she can’t. Because Christen has a Brett. And Tobin has no one -- no one but Christen. 

She’s so wrapped up in her thoughts that she doesn’t process the consistent sound of rustling sheets behind her.

It only takes two words to drag her out of her own mind. 

“Hey Tobs?”

After a moment, Tobin responds in the same gentle tone. “Yeah, Chris?”

“It’s cold.”

“Yeah, I don’t think there’s heat in here. Do you want my blanket or something?”

There’s a pause. 

“Can you come up here?”

Christen hears her take a large, deep breath. But she doesn’t hear a response.

“Please.”

It’s not the begging that does her in. She knows better than that. 

It’s the sniffle that precedes the word, and the voice crack that follows it. Tobin can’t physically take hearing that, so she raises herself from the couch, before taking a step forward and sinking into the mattress of the bed.

She lays on her back and clasps her hands on her stomach, trying to leave as much space as posible between her and Christen. It's not a lot of space, granted it’s a full-sized bed. 

No sleep is happening while she’s laying in the same bed as Christen Press, but trying not to touch Christen Press -- she knows that. So Tobin starts to count the number of logs on the ceiling above the bed instead.

_ … nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirtee— _

Her thoughts are cut off by an ice cold hand pulling Tobin’s hands apart. She feels Christen nudge her body under Tobin’s arm, nuzzling her head under Tobin’s chin and draping an arm across her abdomen. 

Tobin is tense, until another vulnerable, whispered “please” causes her to give in and pull the girl closer into her arms. 

For the first time in a month, Tobin falls asleep instantly. 

__ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ 

There was a subtle but important shift in their friendship after that trip. 

When they had arrived back on campus, Tobin had worked hard to bring an ounce of normalcy back into their routine, starting with regular tutoring sessions.

But in reality, what they were doing could only be described as hanging out, with a little bit of organic chemistry on the side. 

So here they were, seven weeks after  _ the _ argument at the 180 rock -- Tobin and Christen inseparable, and Tobin and Kelley noncommunicative. It was almost comical the way things had changed. 

Today was November 24th, just six days before Thanksgiving, and officially a week out from the biggest organic chemistry test of the semester (aside from the impending doom of the final, of course). 

It’s a Friday.

And Tobin’s sitting in her Biology lecture, contemplating what to do with the rest of her day.

It’s a Friday.

And organic chemistry would be a valid reason to ask Christen what she’s doing tonight, right?

It’s a Friday.

And Tobin knows there’s a pretty big party going on at the football house later that night, But, it’s not like she had anyone there to see. 

Because it’s a Friday.

And Tobin didn’t see Christen on Friday’s. That was designated date time with Brett.

It’s a Friday. 

So why did Tobin just receive a text from Christen asking to meet tonight?

She looks down at the phone in her hand, reading over Christen’s text five or six times -- as she had been doing with all of them lately. 

**8:56 a.m. Chris: Meet me at the 180 at 7:30?**

She had questions. She always did. But she didn’t ask them. 

**9:06 a.m. Tobs: yeah sure**

She tried to put it out of her mind for the time being, a task that was easily becoming her greatest skill.

For the past forty minutes, she had been staring at Kelley’s notebook out of the corner of her eye in Bio lecture. After their ~showdown~, as she and Ashlyn had started calling it, Kelley had taken a break from sitting with Tobin in their biology lecture, instead opting to sit with another junior on the team, Morgan, just a few rows ahead of where her and Tobin usually sat. 

Tobin didn’t move seats. In fact, she put her backpack up on the seat next to her every class period. It was her weird, twisted way of hoping Kelley would come back. 

And just last week, Kelley had shown up to lecture, moved the backpack, and sat down next to Tobin. She hadn’t actually  _ spoken  _ to her yet, but Tobin took it as a gesture of hope. 

Meanwhile, she’s been back on a strict routine, kind of like her own personal preseason. 

After the Biology lecture, she went to the coffee shop. 

After making small talk with Jackie, the barista, she walked through the art sculpture in the academic quad.

After walking through the art sculpture, she ate a Clif Bar.

After the snack, she went to the 4th floor library individual study cubby.

After the library, she ate lunch with Ashlyn and Ali. 

And after lunch came other lectures, practice, studying, Christen, studying, and sleep.

Everyday looked eerily similar, and it provided some much-needed stability for Tobin.

She’s eating lunch with Ashlyn and Ali today, Friday, when her phone buzzes, and she instinctively smiles at the name that pops up. 

“I used to smile like T-squared over there when you texted me,” Ashlyn said to Ali, sitting next to her at the table.

“That’s cute,” she replied.

“You’re cute,” Ashlyn said softly, before leaning in to kiss the brunette next to her. 

They’d finally gotten their shit together and started dating. Tobin was happy for her friends. It was adorable, but also incredibly sickening.

So she takes another bite of her sandwich and mumbles, “You’re gonna make me puke.”

Ashlyn draws her eyes away from Ali to reply to Tobin.

“Your phone smiling is gonna make me puke. Is it chhriissstennn?” she teases. 

Ali smiles knowingly. 

Christen may or may not have disclosed the skinny dipping story to her best friend just the night before.

“If I tell you, I’d have to kill you,” Tobin says, making a fake frowny face.

Ashlyn rolled her eyes. “Well James Bond, me and Ali are gonna have to take off for class before you beat us up.”

Tobin laughs. “Aight, see y’all later.”

She watches them walk away, clutching tightly onto each other, laughing.

_ Wouldn’t that be nice _ .

Dragging her copy of Anna Karenina out of her bag, since she’s now alone at the lunch table, she lets out a sigh, before looking down to read the text and reply. 

(No, she  _ still _ hadn’t finished the novel. A certain green-eyed beauty had been very distracting lately).

**1:18 p.m. Chris: We still on for later?**

**1:27 p.m. Toby: yeee of course, still meeting at the 180?**

She keeps reading between answering texts. Although if one were to assume she looks at her phone impatiently after reading every line, they wouldn’t necessarily be wrong. 

**1:35 p.m. Chris: Actually, I was thinking we could get boba first, if that’s cool?**

So, what if she were a little bold today? 

**1:45 p.m. Toby: damn :/ are you friendzoning me?**

The bubbles appeared and disappeared several times, before a response came through. 

**1:47 p.m. Chris: Lol what**

She bit her lip as she sent the next message.

**1:49 p.m. Toby: everyone knows boba’s the least flirty of drinks**

**1:51 p.m. Chris: Oh do they now?**

**1:55 p.m. Toby: mhm**

**1:58 p.m. Chris: Hahaha alright. What about that wine restaurant thing in town?**

**2:02 p.m. Toby: damn chris, not looking to get married yet**

**2:06 p.m. Chris: Fine, Einstein.**

**2:06 p.m. Chris: Since you know everything, what do you want to do**

_ Just go for it. _

**2:14 p.m. Toby: beer, sushi, and you**

_ Oh shit.  _

Tobin isn’t even bothering to pretend she’s reading her book at this point, instead tapping her leg nervously under the lunch table.

She looks at the time.

**_2:18 p.m._ **

_ Why hasn’t she answered?  _

**2:19 p.m. Toby: *your big orgo brain**

_ Officially your worst cover-up ever. C+ for effort. _

**2:20 p.m. Chris: Yeah, okay :)**

Tobin’s positively grinning embarrassingly at her phone right now. She’s surprised when she feels her phone buzz again with another message.

**2:21 p.m. Chris: My “big orgo brain” is all lonely in lecture right now…**

Tobin is confused for a second before registering the time. 

_ SHIT I’m late.  _

She shoots one more text before she starts running out of the dining hall.

**2:23: p.m. Toby: your fault for distracting me !**

________________________________________

  
  


What Tobin had failed to register in her spontaneous master plan, was the fact that a tropical storm was rolling up the Carolina Coast.

So that’s how she found herself and Christen sprinting through a rainstorm from their college town to the dorms, Christen holding a bag of sushi takeout, Tobin holding a case of her favorite beer, Old Milwaukee, and both of them holding onto each other and giggling as they ran through the rain.

By the time they got back to the dorms, they were completely soaked.

They’re halfway up the six flights of stairs to the sixth floor, when all of a sudden, the stairwell goes dark, and they both come to a halt.

Tobin hears a loud squeal coming from right behind her.

“Is  _ the  _ Christen Press, afraid of the dark?”

“Shut up, Tobs. Where’d you go?”

“Why, you scared?”

“And you’re one to talk, mrs. cartoons-make-me-cry?”

Tobin scoffs playfully. “I told you, they’re like fake reality, but they’re trying to convince you it’s real. It’s so freaky.”

Christen’s hand soon finds Tobin’s in the absolute darkness of the stairwell, as if they just  _ knew _ where each other’s bodies were, despite the lack of visibility.

“I will let you eat all the Idaho rolls if you take me upstairs now.”

In lieu of responding, she just pulls Christen up the stairs behind her, making her way down the sixth floor hallway, and finally launching her into the room in front of her. 

“Home sweet home,” Tobin announces, before flipping the light switch and laughing. “Oops, I kinda forgot the power would be out in here too.”

“I have some candles in my closet that I use while meditating sometimes. I’ll grab them.”

Tobin swallows at the thought of her and Christen in a dark, candlelit room together. 

_ Hold it together rambo.  _

While Christen is lighting the candle, Tobin begins peeling layers off. She throws her wet practice shirt and shorts onto the end of her bed, before sitting on the ground in just a sports bra and spandex. 

When Christen turns around, Tobin doesn’t miss the way she bites her lip as her eyes run down Tobin’s abs hungrily, as she mimics Tobin’s clothes-removal situation with her own.

Even in the dim candlelight, she can make out the blush on Christen’s cheeks when her gaze travel’s back up to Tobin’s face and she realizes she’s been caught. 

Then, they’re just looking at each other. 

Tobin feels like all the oxygen has been sucked out of the room.

She feels like she’s standing on that dock in Appalachia all over again.

Luckily (or is it), Christen starts to speak, as she bends down to open her backpack and pull out a textbook.

“Uh, we can attack some orgo while we eat?”

_ Did she really just take out a chemistry book? _

“Tobs?”

_ Stop staring and say something you idiot. _

“Yeah, yeah good idea. Big test coming up.”

The session starts like every other one. They’re eating, drinking (albeit alcoholic this time), joking about the problems as they go through them.

“Why does this tert-butoxide look like a man throwing a football?”

“Can you do your whole it’s scoring big hoops some other time, so we can finish this, pleaseee,” Christen pouts.

_ She’s so cute. _

“There are no hoops in football, dummy.”

“I know.”

“Do you?”

“Whatever. My point is that all your jokes are meaningless to Aldol Condensation, because Aldol Condensation doesn't care, and neither do I.”

“Well do Halogen SN2 reactions care? Because I’m absolute trash at those too, Chris.”

Christen lets out a loud “ughhh” and falls to her back dramatically, Tobin laughing from a few feet away.

But then things started to shift.

Suddenly, every look was loaded. The space between their bodies  _ ached _ . She really did her best to subdue it, focusing on the orgo. However, an hour in, it was clear that the chemistry in her room extended beyond the textbook.

The drunk also made the problems a little harder to do.

Finally, after maybe 25 drunken minutes spent on one simple question, Tobin wrote down a molecule that somehow matched the answer key.

“Yesss,” she fist bumps the air.

To her surprise, Christen nearly leaps over the sushi to give Tobin a hug.

“I knew you could do it. You’re amazing,” she whispered in Tobin’s ear.

“It’s just a chemistry problem, Chris,” Tobin laughs out quietly.

Christen pulls back, arms still loosely draped over Tobin’s shoulders.

“I mean it though, Toby.”

Tobin usually hated when people called that bad. Suddenly the forbidden nickname didn’t sound so bad coming from Christen.

“You’re amazing, too. So amazing,” she whispers sincerely, staring into Christen’s eyes for a moment, before watching the green beauties travel down to her lips.

Christen doesn’t tense, or pull away this time.

Instinctively, Tobin’s tongue comes out to run along her bottom lip, and Christen’s eyes follow.

Tobin starts to lean in, her eyes now also travelling to the girl’s lips.

They’re slowly moving closer for just a few seconds, Tobin placing her hands on Christen’s bare sides.

But a loud knock disrupts them. 

Christen throws her head back and groans loudly. 

(And Tobin would be lying if she said it wasn’t the sexiest thing she’d ever seen).

“I got it,” she drunkenly laughs out before lifting herself off of Tobin, carefully stepping over the sushi, drinks, and candles, and making her way to the door.

“You can’t have any more Ali, I’m hungry!” she calls out, assuming it is her friend coming back for more sushi. She had already been over twice earlier in the night to try to take more for her and Ashlyn’s movie night. 

But she opens the door, and suddenly wishes it was Ali back for more. 

“Uh, hey B. What’re you doing here?” she says.

_ B? Who could that be? _

Tobin subtly shifts her body, such that she could see a little past Christen, who stood in the half-open door.

There stood Brett, looking like someone just vomited frat row all over him. 

_ Bleh _ .

He was staring down at Christen, who moved her arms across her torso, almost as if to cover up.

They stood staring at each other in the doorway, neither one making a sound. Tobin could practically  _ feel _ the intensity of the interaction from where she sat, 10 feet away on the floor. She had known something was up with them for awhile, but with her and Christen’s… thing?... she didn’t exactly feel like it was her place to meddle. 

_ What’s their deal? Maybe I should’ve asked. _

They were already teetering a thin boundary right now, as it was. 

After about a minute, she saw Brett glance over and around Christen’s shoulder to see Tobin on the floor, next to an assortment of sushi, beer, and three candles. 

Tobin followed his eyes.

_ Yup, I should’ve asked.  _

A fury lights in his eyes momentarily.

“Chris, what  _ is this _ ?” he says in a pained but angry voice.

Christen held him off with two hands on his chest, shoving him toward the hallway.

“Not here,” she says back at him seriously, her light tone from just minutes before nowhere to be found. 

She sees Christen turn around to give her a small apologetic smile, before grabbing her shirt off of the bed and shutting the door behind her. 

_ What just happened? _

Tobin let out a deep breath she didn’t realize she was holding in. 

Before she can really dig too deep into her guilt for almost kissing someone’s  _ girlfriend _ (multiple times now), she decides to distract herself. After about 15 minutes, she had thrown away all the empty sushi cartons, vacuumed and swiffer-ed the floor, and put all the beer in the fridge. She then goes to move all of her and Christen’s chemistry books into neat piles on their respective desks.

_ Studying is probably over for the night _ .

After she finished, Tobin sat down on her bed and pulled out her phone, for the first time since they got back that night.

Truthfully, Tobin had been the worst texter in the world lately. She rarely opened her phone unless the name “Chris” ot “Alex” appeared on her lockscreen. 

Everytime she picked up her phone, she saw Kelley’s thread -- the one with all her unanswered messages -- and it made her shrivel up again inside. So she just opted to not pick up her phone.

Tonight, however, she had a message from Ashlyn. Curious, she opened the thread.

**10:58 p.m. Ash: Ali left. They have an away game tomorrow :( I’m sad.**

Tobin rolled her eyes at Ashlyn’s dramatics. 

She pauses for a moment before responding.

It had been almost a half-hour at this point, so maybe Christen wasn’t coming back.

_ Whatever. _

After shoving her phone in the side of her spandex and grabbing two beers, Tobin makes her way to the door -- destination: Ashlyn’s room, where Christen would  _ not _ be that night.

She’s walking toward Room 602, which is adjacent to the stairwell, when she registers faint yelling coming from the stairwell. As she get’s closer, she hears Christen’s voice.

“Oh hell no, Brett.”

“At least I wasn’t on a  _ date _ with her.”

“How is sleeping with her better than being on a  _ date _ , which I wasn’t on, by the way.”

“Sure you weren’t. That, up there, definitely didn’t look like us three months ago.”

“Yeah because it wasn’t shit.”

“Well at least she didn’t choose fucking her teammate over coming to my big homecoming game.”

“This has been going on since HOMECOMING?!”

“Yeah, Chris. Like you even care.”

“You’re a piece of shit.”

“No.You know what’s shit? You chose every opportunity to go home over the last two years, instead of spending any time with me.”

“My mom has six months to live, Brett.”

She hears a lengthy pause, before the start of footsteps

“Wait, Chris, I’m sorry!”

_ Once again, I was not supposed to hear that. _

She bangs on Ashlyn’s door. No answer. 

She bangs again. No answer.

The footsteps are getting closer.  _ Fuck _ .

Instead, she runs back to her room, shutting the door quickly and gently behind her, before aggressively leaping like an equestrian horse over to the desk, setting down the beers, and pulling out a random book from her  _ portable library _ . 

She stares at the big “Chapter 8” typed out at the top of the random page she opened to, as she registers footsteps approaching. 

The door opens. 

Tobin counts to three in her head before looking up. 

_ One, mississippi _

_ Two, mississippi _

_ Three, mississippi _

Looking up, she expects to see a frustrated, even mad Christen. 

Instead, she’s met with huge, red puffy eyes, and buckling knees.

Tobin stands up and quickly makes her way over to the girl, pulling her into her arms as she starts to crumble. 

Christen cries into her bare shoulder, and she can feel the salty tears dripping down her upper arm and down her back. 

A moment later, she feels Christen’s knees give out. 

Tobin responds by lowering her arms from where they rest on the small of her back to under her thighs, lifting Christen in the air, feeling the girl quickly tighten her arms around Tobin’s neck and move her legs around Tobin’s waist. 

Tobin stands there for another few mintes, swaying and rubbing her back gently as she cries, before taking a few steps backward and maneuvering herself to be sitting on her own bed, back against the wall.

She lowers Christen onto her lap, and continues moving her arms rhythmically up and down, unsure what else to do to console the girl as she continues to hold on tightly and cry.

Sure, Tobin had seen Christen upset many times over the past month or two. There was a lot going on in her life -- Kelley, Brett, her mom, the pressure of school, getting over her ankle injury. She’d sat with a crying Christen several times, usually in a secluded corner in public, or up at the 180 rock. But never had she seen Christen like  _ this _ . It broke her to see the green-eyed girl like this.

They stayed like that for a while, bodies pressed together in the dim room, where only one candle remained lit out of three.

After a half hour, Christen starts to shift a little. She’s practically straddling Tobin at this point. 

Tobin stilled her hands, lowering them to the girl’s hips, as Christen pulled back, meeting Tobin’s concerned eyes.

Just a moment later, she sees Christen’s puffy eyes intentionally lower to her lips, like they had earlier that night. 

Suddenly, the room feels heavy, and the only thing Tobin can see is her green eyes, staring at her lips. 

But this time, there’s no knock on the door. There’s no organic chemistry. There’s nothing else. 

Tobin freezes, her breath catching, before she opens her mouth to speak.

“I —”

Her words are immediately swallowed by Christen’s searching lips meeting her own.

It’s hesitant at first -- lips barely moving, just pressed together gently.

But it’s not long before Christen raises a hand to grip the side of Tobin’s face, slotting her lips between Tobin’s with a grandiose ferocity.

They both sink into a kiss, Christen letting out a soft moan as she bites and drags her teeth across Tobin’s lower lip. The action elicits a gasp from Tobin, which allows Christen to push her tongue into Tobin’s mouth and explore. 

Tobin’s hands moved down to the bottom of Christen’s waist and tightened their grip.

After several minutes, Christen removes her lips from Tobin’s, starting to kiss her way across and down Tobin’s jaw.

It’s then that Tobin feels the wetness dripping off of Christen’s cheeks.

“Wait, wait,” she whispers, pulling back and moving her right hand up from Christen’s hip to brush the dark curls out of her favorite green eyes.

Her favorite green eyes that were streaked red with sadness, with pain. 

Tobin let her fingers move slowly across Christen’s cheekbone, just staring silently into her eyes with concern.

_ “Please,”  _ Christen says, repeating her plea from that night in the cabin, voice wavering. She begins to lean back in.

But Tobin kept studying her face, her eyes. Something about this wasn’t right. She wanted Christen. She wanted her  _ so  _ bad. 

This wasn’t Christen here tonight. This wasn’t right. She had wanted this for far too long, to let it happen this way.

So Tobin stops her, holding her away with a flattened hand across her cheek, whispering “not like this.”

She pauses, moving her hand gently down to caress the side of her jaw, before asking in a gentle voice, “what happened Chris?”

To her surprise, Christen huffs aggressively, new tears streaming down her face, before she shoves herself off of Tobin, feet coming down hard on the cement floor of their dormitory.

“Chris,” Tobin calls out after her. 

The girl turned around, green eyes meeting hazel once more, before walking out of the room, door slamming shut behind her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Unrelated sidenote -- My power finally came back on today! I’m in college down in Texas, and if you didn’t know, we got hit by a pretty massive winter storm this past week (by Texas standards, a state not equipped to handle these conditions.. I’m from up North lol). Over 3.5 million people lost power, and many areas have been without drinkable water for a week. Water pipes are bursting, carbon-monoxide poisoning cases are rising, and much of the homeless and marginally-housed community have been freezing to death, lost their shelter, or have been forced to congregate in close quarters, increasing COVID-19 susceptibility. 
> 
> If you are interested in ways you could help support these communities during this time, here is a link: https://nymag.com/strategist/article/where-to-donate-to-help-texas-winter-storm-crisis.html 
> 
> Thanks so much, and hope y’all are staying safe!


	4. I remember how bad I need ya

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> jealousy & jargon, dealbreakers & disposession.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The saga continues! Everyone’s kinda toxic with a capital T in this chapter, but I needed us to jump on the jealousy train before we arrive where I think I’m going with the next chapter. College and heartache both have very steep learning curves… and they both can make you a little crazy ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯. But don't worry!! We're almost through this wave of angst, I promise.
> 
> Thanks to y’all again for reading this (and for all of your well wishes). Your input was super helpful in helping me carve out my ideas for the next few chapters, so just let me know if there’s anything else you wanna see! Again, hope you enjoy :)!
> 
> (@p -- storm rock coming in the future :D)

She heard Christen sneak back in that night around 3 a.m.. 

Mattress sinking down next to her, head buried under Tobin’s chin, arm carefully draped across her stomach. She was holding onto Tobin as if she knew she wouldn’t get to do it again.

She probably assumed that Tobin was sleeping.

That wasn’t the case. 

Tobin was wide awake. 

Tobin was nowhere _near_ asleep. 

In fact, Tobin barely slept at all that night. 

Instead, she laid on her back, hypnotized by Christen’s rhythmic breathing next to her, trying to convert this feeling to memory.

The sun was already coming up when she was finally lulled to sleep. 

But when Tobin woke up just a couple of hours later, she was all alone. 

_Was it all just a fever dream?_

Not a clue. She felt like she didn’t know much of anything these days.

Tobin slowly reaches for her phone that was placed underneath her pillow, scrolling through the notifications, looking for one name in particular. But she wasn’t at all surprised by its absence. 

Opening the messages app, she types out and deletes a few different texts, before settling on short and simple.

**8:27 a.m. Tobs: hey**

Forcing herself out of bed, Tobin slugs down the hall to the bathroom. She grabs her toothbrush and squirts some plain white, colgate mint toothpaste onto the brush, reluctantly raising it to her mouth.

She can still taste Christen on her tongue from the night before -- the salty-sweet combination of cinnamon gum and escaped tears. It was only for a few minutes. She didn’t get nearly enough of it. But as she ran her tongue across her top lip, it made her mouth water in reminiscence. 

Sighing, she pushes the toothbrush to the side of her mouth and reaches for her phone.

No reply.

Just as she’s about to place her phone back on the counter, the bathroom door bursts open behind her with a loud bang, causing her to jump up in astonishment.

“Do you have to always do that?” she grumpily directs in the direction of the door.

“Damn T-squared, who peed in your cheerios this morning?” replies Ashlyn with a small chuckle as she reached to grab her toiletries from a cubby located behind the door.

Tobin just places her hand back on the toothbrush resting in the corner of her mouth and silently begins brushing her teeth again, moving her attention from Ashlyn to her own figure in the mirror.

“What’s up, T?” Ashlyn asks gently, sensing something is off with her friend. She makes her way to a sink a few places down from Tobin, purposefully leaving some space. 

Tobin takes an audible deep breath, before reaching down and cupping water into her mouth, spitting out the remnants of both her toothpaste and her green-eyed girl, watching as they slowly swirl down the drain.

Then she looks up and over at her friend.

“How long do you have?” she responds cheekily, receiving a raised eyebrow from Ashlyn in return.

______________________________

  
  


Two hours later, Tobin is pushing open the door to the dining hall, sucking in a much-needed breath of fresh air after a lengthy brunch with Ashlyn.

As she sets off on a path to the study loft in the student center, where she was to meet her Sociology group to work on a project, she runs over the past two hours in her head.

For the first time she had told Ashlyn everything about Christen.

_Everything_.

From the first dorm room meeting, all the way to her absence just this morning.

Ashlyn had nodded thoughtfully, offering advice or sounds of acknowledgement here and there, although she seemed to get the memo that what her distressed friend really needed was to get all of this off of her chest. Someone to listen.

She was right.

Oddly enough, Tobin felt a semblance of better after her two hours of word vomiting to Ashlyn, feeling like she set herself free just a little bit. Or at the very least, she would now have some company within the bars of her Christen-induced cage.

But there was one part of the conversation in particular that still nagged at Tobin’s mind.

  
  


_“Dude, you need a chill pill today.”_

_“I needed five... like yesterday,” Tobin replied, taking a large bite of her pancakes._

_“So, what’re you gonna do then?” Ashlyn asked curiously._

_And Tobin paused to think. Because what was she going to do?_

_She’d spent the past 90 minutes reciting every small detail of Christen on her mind, but hadn’t once considered what would happen next._

_“No fucking idea,” she says, quickly checking her phone again._

_No reply._

_“Maybe it’s time to show her what she’s missing. I mean, somebody should, before the whole team isn’t speaking to one another,” Ashlyn laughs out sarcastically._

_Tobin just looks down, no laugh escaping her lips._

_“Sorry, too soon?” Ashlyn grimaces, seeming to notice she hit a sore spot. She then speaks again._

_“Sometimes not getting you want is a wonderful stroke of luck.”_

_Tobin smiles, looking back up at her friend. “Did you just quote the Dalai Lama at me?”_

_“What can I say, he knows his shit… and I may have just finished my philosophy reading before this.” Ashlyn responds. “She doesn’t own you, you know.”_

  
  


_She doesn’t own you._

  
  


_She doesn’t own you._

  
  


Walking to the student center, that line plays over and over in her head. 

So why does she feel so powerless right now? Why does Christen seem to invade every single one of her thoughts lately?

More importantly, why is Tobin _letting_ her?

The question rings throughout her mind as she swings the side-door of the student center open, before walking inside and beginning to climb the stairs to the loft.

But even her ~Christen thoughts~ can’t hold off the overwhelming force of dread creeping up with Tobin, multiplying with each step she ascends.

Why? Well, Kelley’s in her Sociology group.

Since her spat with her best friend nearly seven weeks ago, these weekly Sociology meetings had become the bane of her existence. They more or less consisted of Kelley either completely ignoring her, or throwing (metaphorical) punches. At least when she mumbled snarky comments at Tobin, she was acknowledging her existence.

Lately, it has been the former. Mere silence, identical to the silence she receives from Kelley in her 9 a.m. bio lecture everyday.

And truthfully, Tobin wasn’t ready to face it all. Not this morning. 

However, much to her surprise, when she approached the table today, Kelley let out a quick “hey” along with the other three members of the group.

Tobin looked over her shoulder.

_Is she talking to me?_

There was no one else there, so she just sat down and pulled out her laptop to start working on their Fundamentalism project.

Well, _working_ would be a bit of a stretch in describing Tobin’s activities for the next hour.

When Tobin had suggested an idea for their powerpoint within the first few minutes of the meeting, Kelley had let out a “that’s a great idea” from where she sat on the other side of the table.

_w.h.a.t._

And it continued like that for the rest of the hour : Kelley agreeing with her. Kelley complimenting her ideas. Kelley actually asking her for an opinion on a piece of writing.

The hour felt like an alternate reality.

So Tobin’s mind was really nothing during that hour-long meeting but utterly distracted, filled with an inner monologue psychoanalyzing Kelley’s every action.

When they wrapped up the meeting, Tobin pulled out her phone as she exchanged “bye” and “see you on Monday” with her group members who were already departing from the table.

No reply.

Tobin sighs, pushing her phone into her back pocket, while raising herself from her seat at the table. Looking up, she’s startled to see the small, spicy brunette also still standing next to the table, looking straight at her.

She swallowed loudly in anticipation.

“We’re having a thing at the soccer house on Wednesday,” Kelley says calmly. “Midweek Mayhem.”

“I heard,” Tobin replies in an even tone.

“Are you coming?” 

“Probably not.”

“You should come,” Kelley speaks one last time before sporting a small smile and walking away. 

She doesn’t have time to reply before Kelley has left the cafe.

_Was this real?_

Tobin smacks herself in the face.

_OW. Definitely real._

When she sees just how many people were staring at her as she smacked herself in the face, a blush rises up to her cheeks, and she sheepishly makes her way over to the stairs to leave the loft as well. 

Taking a leap down the last few steps, she takes a left, deciding to go grab her usual iced coffee before heading out.

She was feeling hopeful for the first time today after that ten-second talk with her former best-friend.

That doesn’t last long.

Standing in line for coffee, she goes to unlock her phone to tell Ashlyn to meet her in the library, but instead sees that it opened directly to an unanswered blue bubble sitting at the bottom of her screen. Tobin just stares at it for another moment, before deciding to just bite the bullet and be blunt for once.

**11:14 a.m. Tobs: we need to talk**

Tobin fumbles and nearly drops her phone in astonishment when she sees the little bubbles appear, indicating that Christen is typing.

But just as quickly as they appear, they disappear. She waits, but they don’t come back.

Tilting her head up to the ceiling, Tobin lets out a frustrated huff as she shoves the phone in her pocket. She’s startled from her sad daze by a voice in front of her.

“And to think it's not even noon yet.”

She lets out a small laugh, bringing her attention down to the barista in front of her.

“Tell me about it. Hey Jackie, how are you?” she smiles.

“Better than you I would guess.”

It’s straightforward, but she’s not wrong. 

This _game_ she’s been playing with Christen -- she can’t decide for the life of her what to do about it. She can’t decide if she actually wants to win the game, or if maybe she just liked playing it.

What she had decided for sure, is that she’s sick of Christen moving around her gamepiece. 

“Yeah,” she laughs, looking down at her hands, “long night, longer morning.”

“Ah,” Jackie replies, nodding her head in acknowledgement. “Anything I could do to help take the edge off?”

Tobin shoots her head up at that comment, seeing Jackie’s watchful smirk.

Ashlyn’s words run through her mind once again. _She doesn’t own you_.

Maybe Tobin will just add a new gamepiece to the playing board. Or maybe this is her way of forfeiting. She decides that’s a decision for another time. 

Tobin just smirks back, pulling her phone out of her pocket one last time, lowering her eyes to the screen momentarily.

No reply.

_I’m tired_.

She raises her eyes back to meet Jackies, before slowly leaning her body forward on the counter, weight resting on her forearms. 

“Depends. What did you have in mind?”

Jackie draws her bottom lip between her teeth. She takes a minute to study Tobin curiously, as if she can’t quite figure out why the casually sexy girl who has been coming into the coffee shop all semester is _just_ _now_ deciding to return her flirting.

Before they have a chance to continue their conversation, a manly cough erupts from a few feet behind them, followed by a “some of us have places to be!” grunted out. 

Tobin just grins and pushes herself back to a standing position, letting her arms drag slowly back across the counter. 

“I’ll let you know,” Jackie finally says, still holding eye contact as she slides a black iced coffee across the counter, nine digits written across the lid. “Coffee’s on me.”

Tobin allows their fingers to touch for a few seconds as she grabs the coffee and moves to walk away from the counter, turning her head around once more to send a smile to the blonde barista as she exits the coffee shop.

So maybe she flirted back with Jackie this time. 

Maybe she sends her a text. 

Maybe the girl _actually_ responds to her text. 

Maybe Tobin continues to answer her. 

Maybe it feels nice to have someone who seems to _want_ to talk to her.

Maybe Tobin is getting tired of waiting. 

But maybe she also knows that this new girl could never compare to what she’s been waiting for.

____________________________

  
  


Later that night, Tobin finds herself sitting at the desk in her dorm room, listening to music as she finishes up one last assignment for the day. Earlier, she had told Ashlyn about Kelley’s olive branch, and her friend had _insisted_ that they have a Bro Night “to drink beer and tear apart the deeper meaning of this momentous occasion” …. whatever that meant.

Tobin of course agreed, letting Ashlyn know that she just needed to finish up a discussion board post for one of her classes before they bro’d out together.

Her pencil is just finishing up the last sentence of her response, when she hears the sound of a door opening and shutting over the music playing in her ears.

Assuming it’s Ashlyn barging in early, she doesn’t immediately look up from her laptop. Tobin knows that Ashlyn respects how much she cares about her schoolwork, and that she would just collapse on the bed until Tobin was finished anyway.

It’s not until she hears a large _thud_ a few minutes later that she’s prompted to remove one of her earbuds and give her attention to the scene in front of her.

She’s about to ask Ashlyn what the hell that sound was, when she instead meets a pair of green eyes. A pair of green eyes she hasn’t seen or heard from since she stormed out of the room the night before.

Christen only stays facing her for a moment longer, before breaking eye contact to continue rapidly gathering a series of belongings into a small, purple duffle bag. 

Honestly, Tobin didn’t know what to say. 

“Chris,” she tries calmly.

Silence.

“Chris,” she repeats.

Silence.

“Chris!”, she says significantly louder, standing up and walking slowly toward the girl, as if she’s nervous that if she approaches too quickly, she’ll scare the girl off.

Christen looks up at Tobin, green eyes meeting hazel in the dim evening light.

And for the first time in a month, Tobin does not have even an ounce of recognition of what’s going on behind those eyes.

They just look … panicked.

“I have to go.”

When Ashlyn enters the room less than a minute later, she finds Tobin standing alone in the center of the room, slack-jawed. Because what was _that_.

She carefully watches Tobin turn around and quickly walk over to the window.

Following her friend, Ashlyn settles by the window too, seeing that they are looking out at the quad below. She’s not sure exactly what they’re looking for, but she stays still, recognizing a serious change in Tobin’s demeanor from just a few hours ago.

But then she sees it. 

An unmistakable mop of dark, curly hair, nestled under the arm of one very tall, athletic football player, strolling away from the building, smiling at each other and laughing.

Ashlyn raises her left hand to grab Tobin’s shoulder, a gesture of support, as Tobin lowers her own head into her hands on the window sill.

The rest of the night was spent laying side by side in Tobin’s bed, beers in hand.

There were groans.

There were _this sucks_.

There were _you deserve betters._

There were _what do I even do nows_.

And there was a text sent to a certain blonde barista, inviting her to a party at the soccer house on Wednesday night.

____________________________

  
  


There was a problem.

Christen was still _everywhere_.

But even more than that, Tobin didn’t realize just how much Christen had been embedded into her life, until these few days when she wasn’t in it. 

When she walked up to the coffee cart on the way to 9 a.m. Bio on Wednesday morning, the student working at the cart placed two coffees in front of her -- one black coffee, and one vanilla and hazelnut iced latte.

Tobin just stared at them for a moment, until the student cleared her throat and kindly asked her if she needed anything else.

_Great._

“I’m all set, thank you though,” she said politely before picking them both up, one in each hand.

As she walked away, she held her right arm straight out, perpendicular to her body, and released the latte into the trash, not even slowing her stride.

While actually sitting in her 9 a.m. Bio class just twenty minutes later, she’s subtly scrolling through facebook for the first time in months, when a tan face with light green eyes pops up on her recommended friends list.

_Seriously._

She shuts her phone off for the rest of class. At least it forces her to pay attention, for once. 

When the lecture has finished, she parts ways with Kelley after a prolonged period of exhausting small talk (which seems to be all they know how to do at the moment -- but at least Kelley is speaking to her again), and makes her way over to the Whitaker Clinic for her three-hour volunteer shift.

And what do you know -- she finds those same green eyes staring at the computer at the front desk.

Is she even surprised at this point?

Tobin doesn’t stop walking, just hoping to get down the hallway before Christen recognizes her. 

“What, not even gonna say hi?” she hears from over her shoulder.

Tobin stops walking, but stays facing the hallway.

_Me?_ **_I’m_ ** _not gonna say hi?_

Tobin keeps walking. 

She’s in the volunteer locker room, throwing her stuff in a locker, when she hears a throat cleared behind her.

_Please no._

“What?” Tobin nearly snaps, continuing to stuff her belongings into the locker. 

She’s not mad. That wouldn't be the correct word. She’s just… chilling on an abandoned railroad somewhere halfway in-between the lands of frustration and confusion. 

“Who pissed you off today?” the girl laughs quietly in response.

Tobin turns around at that, to look her in dead the eyes.

“Yeah, wonder who,” she replies in utter sarcasm, before turning slightly to shut her locker. 

“Look, I’m sorry for… avoiding you.”

“Apology accepted,” Tobin says, marching straight past her back into the hallway, hoping to avoid any further confrontation with the girl right now. 

Tobin lets out a breath of relief when she doesn’t hear hurried footsteps following her, and shakes out her shoulders for a moment. 

She was just not in the mood to deal with this right now.

Her volunteer shifts here had sort of become her escape from reality over the past month, and she was hoping to keep it that way.

Tobin’s job there was two-fold. She’d spend two hours at the Patient Information desk, helping underserved patients to navigate the healthcare system, as well as sitting down and helping them address some of their barriers to care. Having worked here for well over a month now, she had even gotten to see some repeat patients and started building trusting relationships with them. 

She smiled as her favorite patient, Gus, an elderly man with a whiddling passion, approached the desk.

“What can I do for you today, Gus?”

“Tobin! Oh I’m so glad it’s you here now. I came by an hour early on accident, and the curly haired girl, hmm, what was her name? Chris, yes Chris! She was a little … frowny.”

_Hah._

“Well I’m sorry about her.” _If only you knew how much_. “Let’s get you checked in, yeah?”

“Sounds good. I brought my latest piece with me today!”

“No way. Get it on up here, let’s see it!”

She spent the next few minutes talking with Gus about the set of birds he had carved in wood, before accompanying him back to a clinical room for his appointment.

Tobin loved this first part of the job -- it gave her a nice preview of what she hoped to continue as a physician someday.

However, it was the last hour that was her absolute favorite.

It was when she got to shadow the physicians, ask way too many questions, and even sometimes help out with physical examinations, if the patient consented, of course. 

Tobin had always been a very hands-on person — in _all_ contexts. So actually getting to work alongside doctors was like an absolute dream, especially while still being a college student.

That hour was her weekly affirmation that she was suffering through organic _fucking_ chemistry for a reason.

It also was a much-needed distraction from the Christen goggles she felt like someone kept super glueing onto her face lately. 

Even more important, she actually felt herself smiling authentically for the first time that week as she was leaving the building at the end of her shift, on her way to meet Jackie for lunch. 

She’s not really sure about Jackie yet. 

The girl is very kind, passionate, and not at _all_ horrible on the eyes. But Tobin is still 10 miles deep in Christen, and she knows that. And she let Jackie know that, because that was the right thing to do. 

And between her and Christen, at least _one_ of them had to do the right thing for once. 

Jackie appreciated the honesty. Imagine that. She’d even said she was getting over someone too, and that perhaps they could just stay casual, have fun, and see where it goes. 

Tobin was more than fine with that. Jacke was exactly what she needed right now. 

So off she went, walking through the clinic doors, on course to meet her. She’d made it through the door and was maybe twenty feet from the quad they said they would meet at, when she felt a small tug on the left sleeve of her black T-shirt.

_Come. On._

She turned her head, and sure enough, there was Christen, standing behind her, arms tight against her torso.

She stopped walking.

_Guess I’ll have to talk to her sometime. May as well do it now._

“Hi, Chris.”

“Hi,” is all the girl says in return.

Tobin rolled her eyes at whatever this was.

_I change my mind. Not doing this now._

“Bye, Chris.”

She started walking.

“Tobin, wait.”

She stopped again.

Tobin didn’t speak this time, she just looked at Christen, deciding she’d let her go first.

“I made a mistake.”

Tobin nearly laughed at that. 

“And what was that exactly?” she asks Christen, wanting to hear her say it. 

But also, Tobin wanted clarification. The confusion about where they stood, and Christen’s apparent refusal to talk about it, was slowly eating her up inside.

Was kissing Tobin the mistake? Or was it the leaving for _him_ again? 

And truthfully, she hasn’t a clue which one it is, and she has somewhere to be so it’s not like she can stick around for the aftermath of whatever bomb the green-eyed girl is about to drop on her anyway.

Christen opens her mouth, but doesn’t speak.

_10 seconds pass._

_20 seconds._

_30 seconds._

_40 seconds._

Finally, Tobin decides to start this conversation for them. Once again, she picks the blunt, but very roundabout path to her point.

“How’s Brett?”

_Okay, so maybe they both suck at this whole direct communication thing._

Another pause.

They continue to stand facing each other for a moment, before a bright voice interrupts them.

“Hey Tobin!” she hears, looking over to see Jackie approaching them from the direction of the quad. Jackie even sends a small, polite smile toward Christen, which surprised Tobin, given that she _knew_ who Christen was to Tobin. 

“Hey!” Tobin quickly replies.

“You need another minute?”

Tobin looks at Christen as she says, “No, I think we’re good here, right Chris?”

_Say no, I dare you_ , says the look on Tobin’s face.

“Uh, uh yeah we’re good.”

_Shame_.

Tobin just nods at her before slinging her arm around Jackie’s shoulder and pulling her in the other direction, promptly starting up a conversation about their week.

She doesn’t even look back at where she left Christen standing.

It took some willpower. 

She wanted to.

But, she’s going to work on that.

______________________________

  
  


The afternoon was spent out at the soccer fields. 

First, with the whole team, as they got ready for their big end of season NCAA tournament that was happening the following weekend down in Florida.

Christen had been there too, but Coach Doug had the whole team separated into drills by position, meaning Christen was off with the forwards, while Tobin stuck with the midfielders.

Tobin wasn’t all too upset about it. She was relishing the space away from the girl. At the moment, it felt like coming up for air after a long bout of swimming underwater.

But Tobin also wasn’t going to lie — she felt _good_ when she felt Christen’s eyes on her every few minutes during the practice.

Sometimes, Tobin would look over, too.

She expected Christen to look away, as if she was caught. 

She didn’t. 

The green-eyed girl wasn’t even trying to hide it.

Then again, why is Tobin even surprised?

Everything about Christen was intentional.

Everything about Christen denied expectations.

To Tobin, Christen was just uniquely divine. 

_Sigh._

After practice ended, Tobin had stayed behind with Ashlyn and a few other juniors on the team to get some work done while sitting together out on the field.

In reality, it was a lot more joking around then actually doing work, but Tobin didn’t mind. She’d been so wrapped up in the Kelley and Christen bonanza for the past two months, that she really hadn’t done anything simple like this in a while.

And Tobin’s a pretty social person. So again, this felt like finally coming up for air. 

She ended up walking back to the dorms together with Ashlyn when the sun had started to set, deciding that they would get ready together for the Midweek Mayhem party that was occurring later that night.

______________________________

  
  


After a few hours of tossing clothes across the room at each other, trying to pick out outfits, and then taking shots of Vodka with Ali to pregame, the three of them finally rolled up to the soccer house together.

On the way there, a douchey looking frat guy — who had clearly already drinken too much that night — had fallen off the sidewalk into a bush. The three of them were still laughing about it as they strolled up the house’s driveway.

Stepping onto the front porch of the house, Ashlyn steps between her two favorite people, swinging an arm around both of their shoulders, but directing her words toward Tobin.

“If you need to leave, just say the word, T.”

“And what’s the word?” Tobin chuckles. 

“Brazil is the only country named after a tree,” Ali suddenly says.

“What?” both Ashlyn and Tobin say in unison, slinging their necks toward Ali as they approach the door.

“That’s our exit phrase!”

They all laugh for a moment. 

“You’re so weird, Al,” Tobin says.

“ _My_ weirdo” Ashlyn repeats, before leaning in to kiss Ali on the cheek.

Tobin slaps Ashlyn in the back of the head, causing her to jump away from Ali. 

“Um, OW.”

“Save it for the bedroom kiddos,” Tobin smiles mischeviously.

Ashlyn punches Tobin in the arm in return. 

“Jeez Ash! What was that for?”

“You hit me first!”

Ali just laughs at the two of them, happy to see the crazy pair back in full-form together after weeks of awkwardness, before reaching up to knock on the door.

“Wait,” Tobin says as she calms down from laughing. “Is that tree thing actually true?”

Before Ali can answer her question, the door swings open in front of them, revealing an enthusiastic Kelley, head turned in the other direction, calling out to someone farther into the house.

Her huge smile fades into a sort of smaller, more neutral expression when she sees who’s at the door. 

“Hey guys,” Kelley says, before looking right at Tobin as she adds, “I’m glad you could make it.”

Tobin smiles back at her friend standing in the doorway.

“Um, drinks are in the kitchen, makeshift dance floor to the left, fire pits running out back next to the hot tub, lounge room to the right,” she says, pointing in all different directions. “Have at it!”

Tobin follows Ashlyn and Ali into the very crowded house, shutting the door softly behind her.

Making her way toward the kitchen to grab a drink takes longer than expected. Every few minutes she’s being pulled aside into a new conversation, catching up with friends. Her smile hadn’t even faltered a bit since she entered the house.

_God_ , she missed this.

When she finally steps over the barrier into the kitchen, it has been almost forty-five minutes. 

She closes her eyes for just a moment, taking a breather until a small, sweet laugh brings her out of her daze.

“Falling asleep on me already?”

“Hey, you made it,” Tobin says with a smile on her face as she steps forward to hug Jackie briefly.

“Thanks for inviting me,” she says sweetly. “This place is _packed_.”

Tobin shrugs, leaning her right hand against the kitchen counter to their right. “Soccer knows how to have a good time.”

“You’ll have to show me,” Jackie says, reaching her left hand out to touch Tobin’s arm briefly.

Tobin just smiles at her for a moment.

“Want a drink?”

“Sure,” Jackie replies. 

“Name your poison.”

“Got any tequila?”

Tobin has a visceral reaction to the mention of the drink, and Jackie looks at her expectantly.

“Me and that drink have a little bit of history.” _Me and Christen_. 

“Ah,” Jackie nods her head. “That’s me and Blue Raspberry Svedka. Drank way too much of it my first night out freshman year, and now I can’t even look at the bottle. I’ll take a beer?”

Tobin laughs. “My kinda girl.”

And that wasn’t completely false.

Tobin had learned a lot about the girl in their week of hanging out every single day. Jackie was sweet, funny, a little sassy, with long blonde hair and beautiful brown eyes. She liked soccer and the beach, and a glowing smile erupted on her face every time she mentioned her family. 

She was everything that Tobin usually likes in a girl. 

But Tobin knew that it wasn’t enough. She knew that, right now, Jackie couldn’t even compare to _the_ girl. 

But she was there. And she was smiling brightly at Tobin. And she was listening to Tobin.

And she was _hot_. And she was _fun_.

So Tobin just let herself go for the night.

She introduced Jackie to her friends. She held onto Jackie’s wait from behind her as she played darts. They even made out by the fire. And they drank several more beers. 

All in all, she was having a great time with Jackie. It felt alright.

They were back inside the house, Tobin pressed up against Jackie’s body by the living room wall, leaving purple marks down the side of the girl’s throat, when she had felt a punch to her shoulder. 

Ten seconds later, she was being dragged -- by Kelley of all people -- into the adjacent lounge room for a game of truth or dare that some of the soccer girls had decided to start up.

Walking into the crowded room, hand in hand with Jackie, she finds an open seat on the couch and pulls the giggling blonde down onto her lap. 

Jackie took one more sip of beer, before carefully removing Tobin’s snapback, and placing it backward on her own head, smiling mischeviously. 

Tobin smiled back.

Just a moment later, she sees Ashlyn and Ali enter the room, and Tobin quickly motions them to come sit next to her and Jackie on the last open spot on the couch. 

Her two neighbors sit down in a similar position, joining in on her and Jackie’s animated conversation about the best old movies. 

Ali is making her pitch for why _Grease_ should rank number one, when Tobin’s attention is suddenly drawn away by the sound of two new voices entering the room.

She watches as Christen drags Brett by the hand aggressively, pushing him down onto a seat, before settling on the floor in front of him. She’s leaning back between his legs, but they’re not speaking. She hasn’t even so much as looked at him. 

_Interesting._

“Earth to Tobin?”

“Oh, uh, sorry,” Tobin says smiling, drawing her attention back to Jackie.

“Thought I lost you there for a moment,” the blonde girl laughs out.

It was clear that Ashlyn had been staring at the same exact thing as Tobin, as she’s now sending Tobin a knowing look. 

“It’s easy to get lost in you,” she lets out, looking into Jackie’s eyes.

Ashlyn and Ali make vomiting noises, and Tobin is making those same noises internally at herself after that horrible line.

But Jackie just smiles back at her. 

_Christen would’ve practically strangled me if I said that to her._

A few minutes later, their movie conversation is once again interrupted by Kelley yelling that she’s going first.

“Alright, Kelley, truth or dare,” Morgan asked.

“Dare.”

“Go jump in the hot tub.”

“Seriously, Morgan?”

“Mhm.”

“Let’s go, Kel!” people start cheering from around the circle.

“FINE,” she huffs out, taking off her shirt and shorts and throwing them back into the center of the circle as she sprints out of the room. 

Two minutes later, a soaking wet, near-naked Kelley, comes bolting back into the room, prompting the whole room to start cheering.

As she throws her clothes on, she takes an exaggerated bow, and Tobin laughs at the _very_ typical dramatics of her best friend.

The game continues, with the next few people choosing truth. After about four more people, Ali’s friend from the lacrosse team, whom Tobin had hung out with on several occasions, calls out her name.

“Truth or Dare, Tobin,” Becky calls out. 

Green eyes snap up to meet Hazel, and Tobin sees the recognition as it flashes through Christen’s green eyes.

She chooses not to keep looking.

“Dare,” she says, as she smiles at Jackie again.

“Seven minutes in heaven, your pick who,” Becky yells out. 

A chorus of “oooo” echoes throughout the room.

She can feel Christen’s eyes on her. 

Again, she chooses not to look.

_She doesn’t own you_. 

Tobin wraps her arms around Jackie’s waist, before standing up and laughing, stumbling in her drunken state as she drags Jackie into the closet, leaving behind a room full of “ _oooooohs”_ and “ _get it, Tobs”_ behind them.

When Tobin turns to shut the door behind them, she feels arms come around her waist, and lips press gently against the back of her neck.

She closes her eyes for a moment, before turning around, knowing after the past five minutes sitting in the same room as Christen that this really can’t happen if the girl is expecting _more_ from her right now than she is able to give.

Oh, how very far Tobin has come in six months. 

“We don’t have to do anything,” she says sincerely to the girl in front of her.

The girl halts her hands where they are moving across the front of Tobin’s shirt. “And what if I want something to happen?” she smirks.

She’s pondering for a moment about how to again tell Jackie that she is still hung on the girl sitting just on the other side of the door, when Jackie cuts off her thoughts as she leans in closer, lips just centimeters from Tobin’s, before pulling back another inch or two.

“I know she’s here,” Jackie whispers in front of Tobin’s lips. “Your move.”

_Enough thinking._

When they come out seven minutes later, they’re both smiling and panting heavy, and it’s not hard to tell what just happened.

They settle back into their spot on the couch, and out of the corner of her eye, Tobin can see Christen glaring at the two of them. It makes Tobin swallow deeply from where she sits.

_Why do I feel so guilty?_

But she puts on a smile, deciding to kiss Jackie’s neck one more time instead.

Christen’s turn doesn’t come for a few more people, but she picks dare.

“Hmm,” says Ali thoughtfully as she tries to come up with an unconventional dare. “Do something right now that scares you.”

For the first ten seconds, Christen doesn’t move a muscle. 

Tobin watches her carefully, curious about what she might choose to do.

Then Tobin watches her stand up, watches green eyes lock onto her own gaze, and watches her start to walk. 

_Why is she walking toward me?_

Tobin looks over her shoulder to see what else could possibly be in this direction. 

Her head is still facing the wall behind her, her arms still wrapped around Jackie’s waist, when she feels two icy hands grab the sides of her face and turn it back toward the center of the circle. 

Before she has time to process what’s happening, she feels warm lips press hard against her own.

It’s hot and messy, and nothing at all like the kiss they’d shared the night before. 

It feels like Christen is trying to prove a point, with the way she roughly captures Tobin’s bottom lip between her own, showing no mercy, before pulling away, dragging her teeth across Tobin’s bottom lip as she does so. She opens her eyes, and stares straight into Tobin’s.

She releases Tobin’s face from her hands and stands back up. Her eyes are still locked on Tobin’s as she tips the snapback off of Jackie’s head and places it backwards on her own head, before turning and walking straight out of the room. 

Brett immediately followed behind her.

And _oh shit_. 

The entire circle has gone quiet, _everyone_ staring at Tobin now.

It’s only a moment later that Ashlyn breaks the awkward silence by announcing that she’ll be going next, and Tobin sends her a grateful look.

“Well she’s kinda loco,” Jackie whisper-laughs in her ear, seeming not to care about the theatrics of it all.

“Yeah,” is all Tobin can say in return. Her brain had short-circuited as soon as Christen's lips had hit her own.

The next two turns feel like ten years to Tobin, and she can’t take it anymore. So during the quiet before the next turn, she blurts out, “Did you guys know that Brazil is the only country named after a tree?”

Teammates and friends around the circle are chucking, saying “no” and “that’s cool”, as if it was just a typical drunk comment. Everyone except Kelley. Kelley was silent, staring at Tobin _intensely_. 

Before she can make too much of that either, Ali gives her arm a sympathetic squeeze and quickly makes up an excuse for the four of them to leave the game. 

“Let’s go get some more drinks together!”

It wasn’t a good one. But it served its purpose. 

Jackie offers to go grab Tobin’s beer for her, unaware of the “exit phrase” meaning, and Tobin quickly agrees.

As soon as Jackie has left the hallway outside the room, Tobin backs up against it, leaning her head back and closing her eyes.

She’s about to push herself off the wall and enter the party again, when she’s stopped by a familiar hand on her arm. 

“Hey, you okay?”

_Oh god I can’t take any more of this right now._

“Yeah, weird day I guess,” she responds quietly to Kelley.

“I’m sorry about her.”

She wants to be annoyed. She wants to say _so now you care?_ But she can’t. 

Because in this moment, she’s feeling nothing but nostalgia for the times it was just her and Kelley against the world, free of all the other shit currently consuming her life. 

“Not your fault.”  
  


“Not yours either.”

It’s only three words. But these three words mean _everything_. And Tobin feels a wave of relief flowing through her, recognizing Kelley’s roundabout way of saying she’s sorry.

Tobin just looks at her for a moment. 

Kelley coughs awkwardly. 

(They’ve never been good at confrontation).

“Um, Jackie seems nice.”

“Yeah, yeah she is,” Tobin smiles out.

“It’s good to see you.”

“You see me like everyday,” Tobin replies sarcastically.

“You know what I mean.”

And yes, she does know.

Before they can continue, Tobin sees Jackie re-entering the hallway in her peripheral vision.

Kelley gives her arm a last squeeze before turning around to head back into the lounge room.

Jackie hands Tobin a beer, oblivious to whatever tension was filling the hallway just moments before, and speaks up.

“Want to get out of here?”

Tobin lets out a big huff. “Yeah, I _really_ do.”

“Cool. Wait for me on the porch? I just realized I left my phone out back.”

“You got it.”

Tobin proceeds to weave through the crowd of people still standing and dancing around the living room, eventually opening the front door and stepping out onto the porch.

She’s taking a long swig of beer and turning around from shutting the door, when she sees her, leaning up against the porch railing.

Tobin pauses for just a moment, lowering her beer from her lips, before slowly approaching Christen, standing shoulder-to-shoulder at the front of the porch.

“I believe this is mine.”

She reaches a hand up and grabs her snapback off of Christen’s head, placing it snugly back on her own head.

Christen doesn’t answer right away.

“Did you ditch that blonde?” she finally says.

It’s almost funny. 

“ _That blonde_ has a name,” Tobin responds calmly. “It’s Jackie. And no, she’s just grabbing her phone.”

“So what?” Christen breathes out. “You’re dating someone now?”

Tobin lets an austere silence develop between them for a few seconds. No, her and Jackie aren't dating. But she didn't feel like that was Christen's information to know anyway. 

“What do you care?” she finally lets out, before taking another sip from her beer bottle.

“I just think you can do better.”

“I think it’s none of your business who I date.”

“It is, we’re best friends Tobin.”

Tobin laughs at that.

“Are we?” she asks as she turns her head to look at Christen.

There’s a pause.

Tobin continues. “You want to know what I think?”

Christen nods her head almost imperceptibly.

“Enlighten me.”

Tobin turns to her left to face Christen entirely, her right arm still leaning on the railing. “I think I met a nice girl who doesn’t hit me with a metaphorical freight train every two seconds. And I think that scares you, that I found someone who actually makes me feel good. Someone that's not you.”

It comes out a little harsher than she intended it to. After all, over the last two months of hell, Christen had almost exclusively been the source of her happiness. 

Tobin’s just feeling a little fired up tonight, and who could blame her?

Christen takes two steps toward Tobin, until she’s practically pressed up against her front. 

“She couldn’t make you feel half as good as I could,” Christen states in a low voice, almost growling as she looks back and forth between Tobin’s eyes, which are just inches from her own.

Tobin doesn’t move away. 

_She's jealous._

“Where’s your boyfriend?”

“Stop asking me about him,” Christen says in frustration.

“Stop being with him,” she challenges.

“Tobin…” she breathes out.

They quickly jump apart when the door opens just a moment later. Tobin turns her head to see Jackie walking out of the house, alongside Ashlyn and Ali, but she can see Christen still staring at her out of the corner of her eye.

It’s déjà vu at its finest.

Jackie is down the porch steps already, laughing about something with Ashlyn and Ali as they walk across the front lawn. 

Tobin turns her head back toward Christen.

She begins to take slow steps backward, eyes still locked on one another.

_Stop me if you dare._

Green eyes, begging her to stay.

_Say something, then_.

She doesn't say anything. 

And then it’s like the first night all over again.

Except now Christen is the one left standing all alone on the front porch.

And for a single, ephemeral moment, Tobin can’t find it in herself to care.


	5. cutting up the floor in a sorority t-shirt

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> blurry bodies (but you’re on my mind)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alright lovely people, things are happening. This chapter is kinda all over the place. Thank you so much for reading, and for your comments. Y’all are so kind! 
> 
> Also, your suggestions are crazy helpful since I have no idea what I’m doing here! I intentionally wrote Christen to be mysterious and confusing, so that we would have to make guesses and go through some of the same emotions as our gal Tobin. Next chapter will be Christen’s pov of this chapter’s events (filling in some of the blanks, and questions will be answered!).
> 
> Big ups for CP’s 60th goal this week :) Hope you enjoy!

In the three weeks following the Midweek Mayhem party, three things happened.

____________________________

First, Tobin and Kelley had started hanging out again.

____________________________

The night of the party itself, Tobin had ended up sleeping over at Jackie’s off-campus apartment. Although, to be honest, there wasn’t much sleeping.

When they woke up Thursday morning to a 7:30 a.m. alarm, Jackie reluctantly peeled herself from Tobin’s warm body and pushed herself out of bed.

“Hey, Tobin,” she whispered, leaning over the bed

“Mmm,” Tobin grunted out, eyes still closed.

“I have to take off soon for work, but you can sleep in, I don’t mind,” Jackie continued to whisper, before leaning down to kiss Tobin on the cheek.

But Tobin grabbed her arm as she pulled away.

“Wait, I’m coming with you,” she mumbled, before dragging herself out of bed, too.

She walked Jackie to the student-center that morning, so that she could pick up some caffeine for herself as well. She was going to need it to get through today.

When they walked in, Jackie was midway through telling her a story about an unfortunate run-in with a snowman that last time she went skiing, so Tobin ended up ordering a vanilla latte just to buy some extra time talking to her.

Five minutes later, Jackie is sliding her coffee across the counter and Tobin is saying a reluctant goodbye as she leaves for her 9 a.m. Bio lecture. 

They had a _good_ time together.

She’s holding the latte in one hand, her phone in the other, power-walking toward the door of the student-center, when she sees a notification pop up on the top of her screen saying:

_“Dr. Ellis has opened the quiz for Thursday morning, 11/27_ ”

And oh no.

Tobin’s only had a moment to open and start reading through the syllabus for the class, trying to find out just how much of her grade bombing this quiz was going to sacrifice, when she felt a pinch on the back of her neck that almost caused her to drop her coffee.

She knows _exactly_ who that was.

She hadn’t felt that pinch in a while.

Is it weird to say she’s kinda happy about it?

It gave her hope that their iconically indirect apology fest in the hallway at the soccer house the night before had potentially opened the door to starting over. 

“Kelley, you literally suck,” she says as she brings her unoccupied hand up to rub over the back of her neck.

Kelley holds the door to the student-center open in front of her, Tobin mumbling a quick thanks as they step outside into the early winter chill. 

“Hey be careful, I only just started liking you again.”

Tobin rolled her eyes, and the pair started walking on the path that transected the academic quad. “Whatever. You ready for the quiz this morning?”

Kelley looks at her with the most panicked of faces. “ _Quiz?_ ”

“If it makes you feel any better, I had just discovered said quiz existed within five seconds of you pinching me.”

“Well, guess we’re both gonna take an L then,” Kelley notes, before looking over at her friend and nervously beginning to speak again. “Which also means we’re gonna need some comfort food after. Brunch together after class?”

And just like that, she watched Kelley open the door to a new beginning.

“I would really like that.” 

But Tobin’s smile quickly turns into a scrunched face of confusion, mirroring her friend’s sudden face change. Kelley rips her coffee from her hand, holding it up to her eyes to inspect it.

“Uh, whatcha doing?”

“Is this a _latte_ ? Is Tobin-I-only-drink-lighter-fluid-Heath drinking a _latte_ this morning?” she says, still boring her eyes into the plastic cup.

“Lattes take three times the amount of time to make as a blacked iced coffee,” is all Tobin gives in response. 

“And…”

“And I was at the student-center coffee shop this morning…” she trails off. 

A look of realization moves over Kelley’s face, before she punches her friend in the shoulder lightly. 

“Such a fucking simp. Who have you _become_ without me?”

Tobin shoves her friend back, smiling. “Hope I don’t have to find out again.” 

She says it in a joking tone, but her earnest face gives her away.

A quiet settles among them as they make their way up the stairs to their seats at the end of one of the middle rows.

But as soon as they sit down, Tobin feels Kelley’s hand grab her own gently, and she looks up at her best friend. “Me too.”

For the first time in a while, Tobin didn’t leave that biology lecture with a strong and imminent urge to punch something.

And it was exceptionally awkward at first. 

But she supposes that was to be expected after two months chock-full of ignorance and hostility. 

There was so much decidedly unsaid that neither one of them knew where to begin, really.

“So, my dearest simp, what’s the deal with your girl Jackie?” Kelley had asked her when they sat at the table together, in the company of two notably _huge_ stacks of pancakes. 

“She’s not _my girl_ ,” Tobin quickly counters while staring straight at the pancake she was cutting. 

Kelley’s a little offset by the swift response.

“But you were all smiley this morning,” Kelley frowns.

Tobin peered up at that, stopping her knife movement for a nanosecond

“Oh, she’s great. We just talked about… stuff, too, that’s all.”

Truthfully, Tobin was hoping to avoid this conversation. Mostly because she didn’t want to have to discuss with Kelley _why_ it was that her and Jackie had that talk. 

Not that it would be some subtantial, newborn revelation. Kelley _did_ witness the whole Christen kiss thing too. 

But they’d literally _just_ started talking again. 

It didn’t exactly feel like the time to conduct a verbal analysis of a certain curly-haired, green-eyed girl, and everything that had happened since that night at the 180.

No thank you. 

Her friend just nodded dubiously and asked her upfront why she was being so vague.

So, Tobin explained it to Kelley the best she could.

Jackie wasn’t dumb.

She hadn’t made a huge deal at the party about Christen’s kiss during the game of Truth or Dare. In fact, her inattentive reaction had made Tobin think that maybe she didn’t care at all.

That wasn’t _completely_ true. But Jackie had told her later that night, as they walked back to her apartment, that she was semi-relieved that it happened. 

_“You looked legitimately mortified enough as it was, and I wasn’t about to make that any worse for you,”_ she had expounded. _“But I saw the look on your face after, Tobin. We both know I’m not even in the competition, here_.”

And for a moment, Tobin had felt atrocious. She knew _exactly_ how it felt to be on Jackie’s side of that comment. And she never, _ever_ wanted to be the one to make someone feel that that. 

At the same time, she owed Jackie some honesty.

Because Jackie was entirely correct.

Just as she was about to start profusely apologizing, Jackie surprised her.

_“I never wanted to be in the competition though, Tobin, so dont get all frowns and apologies on me,”_ she had said with a small smile across her cheeks. _“I meant what I said about not wanting anything more than casual fun. I was a little nervous to bring it up, but it seems after tonight like we might be on the same page…”_

“Okay, but you clearly stayed over,” Kelley says slowly. “Does that mean you guys were on the same page?”

“Yup,” she answers, finishing the with a popping ‘p’ sound. “I realized we were.”

She and Jackie hadn’t exactly defined it, but they been leaning toward something in the realm of friends with benefits before they got… distracted. It gave both of them what they needed. A diversion, some fun, someone to listen, someone who _cares_. 

And Tobin really liked Jackie. They had already become such good friends in the short time they had known each other. The blond girl was the first close friend she had made who was completely outside of the student-athlete realm. It was refreshing. 

Their ‘friends’ status made it feel like much less of a big, scary deal when Tobin asked her the following week if the girl wanted to come hangout in Florida over the long weekend for the NCAA tournament. Her teammates had invited lots of people to come down and cheer on UNC, and Tobin was thrilled to get to hangout more with Jackie down there.

In fact, she’s not sure if she is more excited about it, or if the team is. Jackie had seemed to be an instant hit with the girls, even getting invited to one or two of their team dinners in the few weeks preceding Florida.

Plus, it was a big, nerve-wracking tournament. 

It didn’t hurt to have a supporter that was there _just_ for her. And it didn’t hurt that Jackie was sort of built-in stress relief at the moment. They both were for each other, really. 

If one thought Jackie got along oddly well with the soccer team, well then she got along _exceedingly_ well with Kelley. They both had this sort of ‘sweet, but spitfire’ vibe that seemed to be unique to the two of them. On more than one occasion, Tobin had returned to her dorm to find Jackie and Kelley hanging out without her, or just about to play some big prank on her.

Just last week, she’d walked through the door into a contraption that soaked her in silly string. Yup, that was a _time_.

Tobin had thoroughly filled Jackie in on all the Kelley and Christen drama over dinner one night shortly after Midweek Mayhem, and she was amazed at the way Jackie seemed to start going out of her way to be the perfect buffer she and Kelley needed to ease back into their relationship. 

Jackie was becoming a _great_ friend to the both of them. 

And by hanging out with Jackie’s friends too, Kelley and Tobin began making new friends all over campus together.

Eventually, they began hanging out just the two of them. The duo juggled before practice, studied in the library together, held up the coffee line time and time again to bother Jackie, and rewrote their story at the 180 rock, with a superior ending.

Their resurrected friendship also made team gatherings, like practice, lunch, and dinners, much more enjoyable for _everyone_. 

They talked a lot during those three weeks, catching up on life. It’s somewhat alarming how much can happen in a few months. 

Everything was covered, except a certain curly-haired, green-eyed girl.

But that did not _by any means_ indicate that the girl was not still somewhere in Tobin’s mind during every single conversation.

____________________________

Second, Christen had backed off a little.

____________________________

  
  


The first few days after the party had been _tense_ , to say the least.

It was strange.

Christen would keep _trying_ to talk to her. Then an hour later, Tobin would see the girl walking hand-in-hand with Brett. 

Tobin had absolutely no idea what was going on with her.

And she had even less of an idea of what to do about it.

The attempts at starting conversations were incredibly tempting, making Tobin want to give in to her time and time again. The problem was that Christen never actually _said_ anything in these conversations.

Nothing of substance, at least. 

Nothing that made her believe anything had changed. 

Nothing that made Tobin foresee anything for herself but more getting hurt.

Just the other day, she had walked up to Tobin, gotten her attention, and then taken this big, deep breath, as if she was about to say something meaningful. Tobin waited with a sense of eager anticipation.

But then she said, “You ready for the big test on Thursday?”, and Tobin’s face fell. 

_Mental eye roll_. 

Tobin wanted to initiate a conversation with her _so_ badly. She wanted to talk about the other night, what Christen had indirectly admitted when she kissed Tobin for her dare.

When she had silently confessed that something about Tobin _scared_ her. 

At this point, she had learned that Christen has to be the one to break down that barrier, or they’ll never surmount it. Tobin had an inkling that there was something a little deeper going on with her, too. Something she didn’t know about yet. 

Unfortunately for Tobin, Christen’s rollercoaster of presence and absence did not come without some semblance of a price. She'd spent a lot of time in her feels in those few weeks.

She cried.

In the dorm room, on the stairs up to the study loft, while longboarding across campus, wet eyes while sitting next to Christen in organic chemistry, and pretty often on the 180 rock at night, a bottle of _that_ tequila in hand.

What she didn’t know was that Christen had watched her fall apart. Christen was _always_ watching her. 

But Tobin was busy.

And Tobin had her best friend back. 

And Tobin had a Jackie. 

And Tobin was happy again.

And Tobin was finding little reason to sit around waiting for the green-eyed girl to get her shit together.

And Tobin started to shut that door in her mind.

But she knew that her mind propped the door open. It wasn’t even subconscious.

She’s not sure she could ever close it completely. 

She is, however, sure that she’d staged a successful coup. 

Tobin was in control of the game now. 

And, as a result, Tobin had felt tangibly felt Christen remove her hands from Tobin’s throat.

It didn’t bring much relief at all. 

Because Christen’s _“hands”_ may be gone, but Tobin isn’t sure if this new feeling is suffocation, or just learning to breathe again.

She had decided to just give it some time. Again, the problem was that Christen was always looking at her, and trying to talk to her, and then, as if she flipped a switch, was attached to Brett’s side.

Now, Tobin was an incredibly perceptive person. She read people as well as the books in her _portable library_.

Tobin couldn’t read Christen right now. Not even a little. 

And it was an all-consuming phenomenon.

Everytime she felt like Christen had made her choice, she did something that once again ripped the solid ground from underneath Tobin’s feet.

The green-eyed girl was like an unfinished puzzle that taunted her to come back for more. 

And so she took her feelings out on the 180. 

_It was half past 10 p.m., a week after Midweek Mayhem, and it had just started drizzling._

_Tobin reached her arm out and looked up to the sky._

_As soon as she felt the drops, she sighed, knowing she’d have to leave soon before the rock got too slippery and she couldn’t climb down. She also sighed because she didn’t want to climb down. Tobin was taking a much needed breather from her life on the ground 15 feet below._

_She had nearly convinced herself to start heading down, when the sound of dragging footsteps echoed through her ears._

_There was only one person that could be._

_“Haven’t seen you in a while,” Tobin said, still facing the front side of the rock._

_“I know.”_

_“I can go.”_

_Funny how it only took the sound of Christen’s voice to make Tobin want to catapult herself off of this rock._

_She’s starting to push herself up from where she sits, when she feels a hand on her shoulder, and a voice rings down from above her._

_“You’re fine, just stay.”_

_Tobin reaches her hand up and across her body and carefully removes the girl’s hand from her shoulder. She hold’s on for just a moment too long, before releasing the girl’s hand.._

_“Nope. I’m going to go.” she says, pushing herself to her feet and wiping her hands on the front of her sweatpants._

_She can feel green eyes are staring at her, as if the girl in front of her isn’t quite sure what to do with a Tobin who doesn’t listen to her._

_And then Tobin’s staring back, just not sure what to do with Christen in general._

_They’re both just standing there, until Tobin feels the rain starting to pick up pace._

_“It’s raining, we should get down.” She saunters toward the back of the rock, where they typically climb up and down the plentiful grooves in the stone._

_No dragging footsteps were heard in the subsequent seconds, so Tobin turns her head around toward Christen, finding she hasn’t moved an inch. “You coming?”_

_“I think I’m gonna stay up here.”_

_“Just come on.”_

_“I’m fine.”_

_Tobin sighs in frustration -- a feeling that has become all too familiar to her as of late. Soon, her eyes are starting to get wet from more than just the rain pounding down around them._

_“Chris, if you stay up here, then I’m going to have to stay. I’m tired.”_

_“You can go, Tobin.”_

_Seriously? It’s almost astonishing how fast they had gone from nonstop talking to whatever the hell this is._

_“No, I can’t,” she raises her voice, bringing a hand to her forehead to rub her temple gently._

_“Don’t worry about me.”_

_She knows Christen isn’t stupid, can see in her eyes that she knows she needs to get down before the rock gets even more slippery. It’s almost like she just enjoys pushing Tobin’s buttons._

_Tobin’s had enough._

_“But I do!” she practically yells, tears starting to slide down her cheeks as she moves her hands to gesture at the girl in front of her. “All I fucking do is worry about you.”_

_The following pause is overwhelming._

_A sad look overcomes Christen’s face at the unexpected outburst. But it’s only there for a moment, before she seemingly forces it back into a neutral expression._

_“Well you shouldn’t,” she asserts._

_“Well I do,” Tobin responds quietly._

_There’s an even longer pause._

_“Tobs, you deserve more than_ _this,” the green-eyed girl says, before breaking eye contact and looking at the ground._

_It’s the closest Christen has ever come to talking directly about whatever the hell was going on between them. And Tobin isn’t sure whether to be overjoyed at the fact that she made that comment, or pissed at the actual content of the comment._

_She settles on taking a few careful steps across the now-wet rock toward Christen, arms outstretched for balance, and carefully hooking her pointer finger under the girl’s chin and pulling up until she sees those green eyes again._

_Tobin just watches her for a moment, trying to understand all the swirling emotions in the girl’s eyes. There’s sadness. There’s regret. There’s fear. And there’s an ounce of desire._

_Then, she drops her hand and breaks eye contact, looking down at the ground for a second as she thinks to herself, ‘sometimes I feel like I can’t breathe without this.’_

_And then she hears Christen’s feet dragging backwards. It’s like the lake all over again._

_Did I say that out loud again?_

_Fuck._

_It was a lot. Maybe a little too much, given the circumstance._

_But now it’s out there._

_And they’re standing on a rock fifteen-feet off of the ground. One-story away from reality._

_And there’s no dock for Christen to swim too, nowhere for her to run._

_Tobin doesn’t even need to look back up to know Christen was about to shut her out once again._

_So, she decides to make just one more comment, while she’s still aboard this embarrassing confession train._

_“I think you deserve to be happy,” she carefully enunciates._

_Tobin was right -- she looked up to see the hardened expression Christen’s face had sunken into, successfully hiding any emotion whatsoever._

_But, those green eyes._

_They could hide_ **_nothing_ ** _._

_Tobin stared into them again. And she sees something new -- conflict._

_And then she sees them gloss over as Christen speaks again, quietly._

_“Does your girlfriend know you’re suffocating without other girls?”_

_“Other girl. Singular.”_

_And once again, it’s a little too much. But that train had already left the station, anyway._

_Christen looks legitimately pained. She takes a deep breath while turning away, and Tobin could swear that one of the droplets running down her face was not from the rain._

_And Tobin knows nothing but disappointment is coming. She needs to get back on the ground below them, back to reality._

_She lets out a huff. “Can we get off the freaking rock now?” There’s no emotion in her voice at all anymore._

_“You can just —”_

_“Chris,” she cuts her off._

_“Fine.”_

_They make their way over to the edge of the rock, Tobin sliding herself down and carefully descending, almost losing her grip a few times before finally landing two feet on the ground._

_Phew_.

_Unlike her, Christen loses her grip about halfway down, letting out a small yelp as she falls toward Tobin, who catches her with open arms. She places Christen carefully on the ground, letting her fingers linger one last time before she returns to reality._

_“I swear to god if you say I told you so…” she says._

_Tobin rolls her eyes._

_“I told you so.”_

_“You’re the worst,” Christen replied, poking just under Tobin’s sternum._

_Then they’re both laughing a little. And then it fades into a serious quiet._

_A few minutes later, she’s walking away from the 180 rock, in the opposite direction of Christen._

_She knows where the girl is going._

_She doesn’t want to think about it._

_Halfway to the dorms, she feels her phone buzz in her pocket._

**_10:57 p.m. Chris: I think I do, too._ **

_Tobin knows she’s responding to the comment Tobin had made on the rock. It’s vague, but at the same time, it tells her everything she needs to know._

  
  


It’s two weeks later, now, and they haven’t explicitly spoken since that night. 

Tobin had been spending her time with Ashlyn, Kelley, or Jackie. Often, all three of them at once. 

She was content, but still curious. 

Christen was still around, her unrelenting presence not wavering even a smidge. The difference was that, after that night, Christen was no longer translucent.

Every look now was loaded. 

Intangible, yet rife with emotion.

Green eyes were still watching her, but it was more than that. Tobin could _feel_ every glace.

She still saw the girl walking around with Brett. And she knew Christen saw her walking around with Jackie. But their eyes met on the daily, and it was like they _knew_ that something was coming -- _knew_ that the tone had shifted after that night on the 180.

She could practically see Christen fighting to break down whatever walls were keeping her locked inside herself.

The question -- the challenge -- was in who would act first. And when. 

She _hated_ that she _loved_ to see the green-eyed girl.

But she _loved_ that she _hated_ it.

Because it meant that _she wasn’t done yet._

There’s delectable pleasure in the formidable pain.

____________________________

Third, UNC is seeded #3 in the End of the Season NCAA tournament in Florida. 

____________________________

That meant one thing and one thing only -- away weekend with the girls.

And that’s how Tobin finds herself stepping onto a huge bus alongside 22 other girls at five o’clock one morning, about to embark on a 10 hour drive to Northern Florida. 

She’s making her way down the aisle, when she feels her phone buzz in her pocket. She reaches down and pulls it out. 

**5:22 a.m. Chris: That shirt looks good on you.**

_Oh._

She looks up as she continues walking, searching for those green eyes in the low light of the bus at dawn.

Of course, she has no trouble finding them, a small smile making its way onto her face as she does so.

And the girl is just looking at Tobin -- which obviously is not an unusual occurrence. But this time, what Tobin sees looking back at her is _different_.

It’s fiery.

It’s bold.

It’s unrelenting.

She doesn’t answer the text. It’s not enough. But she does hold her thumb down and like-react to it, all while she’s still staring into Christen’s eyes and walking down the bus aisle.

Tobin’s removed from her not-too-subtle staring match when she trips over a leg, causing her to stumble and nearly plummet to the floor. 

Turning her head, she is presented with none other than a misceviously-smiling Kelley O’Hara, with an outstretched leg.

An unconvincing angry look surfaces on Tobin’s face.

“What? You were about to walk right by me. Sit, sit, sit! I brought Monopoly Deal.”

_How does anyone have this much energy at 5 a.m.._

Monopoly Deal was Kelley and Tobin’s very favorite game. They’d been facing off since they were fourteen, and now they hadn’t played in almost three months.

“You’re a little excited for someone who is about to get their half-pint ass schooled” Tobin jests.

Mock offense passes over Kelley’s face. “Bring it on, Tob.”

They played for a few hours, until unfortunately Kelley had whooped her ass so many times that Tobin’s competitive edge was starting to throw her into a rage. She admitted defeat, and Kelley fell asleep shortly after, head resting on her shoulder.

It prompted a genuine smile from Tobin. An inkling of how things used to be.

Tobin, on the other hand, doesn’t do naps. Not that she can’t fall asleep anywhere — she is the notorious couch surfer, after all —, rather she doesn’t like to miss any of the day. Even a seemingly boring bus ride. 

So she pulls out her phone to text Ashlyn.

  
  


**12:01 p.m. Tobs: pls tell me you’re awake**

**12:03 p.m. Ash: I’m a caffeine addict, T-squared.**

**12:05 p.m. Tobs: lol valid point**

**12:06 p.m. Ash: so what’s shakin bacon ?**

**12:07 p.m. Tobs: just lost 4 games of monop deal to Kel, now she’s asleep**

**12:09 p.m. Ash: oof, rough morning for you T**

**12:10 p.m. Tobs: shut up, i'm rusty. plus, ill get her on the way back**

**12:12 p.m. Ash: you know you say that every time right?**

**12:14 p.m. Tobs: ughhh stop**

**12:14 p.m. Ash: :-)**

**12:14 p.m. Tobs: i need entertainment**

**12:15 p.m. Ash: you are the entertainment**

**12:17 p.m. Tobs: ?**

**12:19 p.m. Ash: She hasn’t taken her eyes off of you in like an hour dude**

Tobin’s fingers freeze when she sees Ashlyn’s message. She looks up right away and scans over the rows on the opposite side of the bus.

Sure enough, she meets Christen’s gaze.

And once again, Christen is caught.

But she doesn’t look away. 

Instead, she lets the corners of her mouth pull up into a subtle, close-lipped smile.

This time, Tobin is the one to break away, returning her head back down into her lap where her phone is resting. 

She returns to Ashlyn’s text to send the rolling eyes emoji, before she clicks on the text chain with Christen, looking for the message from earlier to make sure she wasn’t going crazy.

That message is there, followed by a new one she hadn’t seen before.

**5:22 a.m. Chris: That shirt looks good on you.**

**12:22 p.m. Chris: kinda rude not to compliment a girl back :///**

_This is new_. 

**12:25 p.m. Tobs: well, compliments make you run. And I kinda need you rested so we can beat Stanford tomorrow sooo…**

The three bubbles appear right away, and Tobin glances over to see the girl looking down at her phone, a definite smile on her face.

**12:26 p.m. Chris: How thoughtful of you**

**12:27 p.m. Tobs: i do my best**

**12:26 p.m. Chris: Unfortunately, I’m stuck on a bus right now, so you won’t have to worry about that**

**12:28 p.m. Tobs: nope, I’m not gonna be responsible for our best striker jumping out the window of this bus**

Her head slowly turns to look at Christen, seeing her roll her eyes before placing her phone down on her lap and turning her head to look out the window.

_What is this?_

Tobin sends a screenshot of the text chain to Ashlyn, one of the two people (the other being Jackie) who know the full extent of the Christen Crisis (as they called it). 

Well, Ali probably knows too, since her and Ashlyn have literally _zero_ secrets. They’ve become even more infuriatingly adorable in the past few weeks, if that was even possible.

She and Jackie were still hooking up, but they had really embraced the definition of ‘casual fun.’ And the blonde girl would never say it to Tobin's face, but she was secretly rooting for those two to get their shit together. 

A few minutes later, she sees her screenshot appear in a message in her group chat with Jackie and Ashlyn. 

**12:35 p.m. Ash: [Image.]**

**12:47 p.m. Jax: omg**

**12:48 p.m. Ash: yoooo this is some tea**

**12:49 p.m. Jax: piping hot**

**12:50 p.m. Jax: Someone fill me in on the bus situation**

**12:52 p.m. Tobs: seriously ash???**

**12:53 p.m. Jax: c’monnn**

**12:54 p.m. Tobs: literally nothing has happened**

**12:58 p.m. Jax: Ashlyn!!!**

**12:59 p.m. Tobs: watch me not let you in my room tonight**

**12:56 p.m. Jax: i’m wearing that red thing you like**

**1:07 p.m. Ash: GUYS. TMI. Almost as gross as the hungry staring contest between these two :-)**

**1:08 p.m. Jax: AH**

**1:10 p.m. Tobs: you guys suck**

Tobin knew that her friends were just trying to help out, but she was hesitant to let them get involved. Especially when she wasn’t even one percent sure there was _something_ to help out with yet. So she locked her phone and looked out the window for the rest of the ride. 

____________________________

An hour later, Tobin exits the hotel room bathroom and chuckles at the sight of Kelley fully sprawled out across the bed closest to the window, limbs outstretched like a starfish.

When Couch Doug had called out “Heath and O’Hara” as a rooming pair in the hotel lobby, she had been simultaneously overjoyed, disappointed, and relieved. 

She swore she saw the same three emotions run through Christen’s face. 

The team was given a few hours to get settled in at the hotel before they were planning on going out for dinner that night at a local mexican restaurant. 

“You look dead,” Tobin comments, making her way over to the other bed and sitting down. 

“Well that’s just rude,” Kelley returns in a mock angry tone. 

Tobin laughs for a moment, not sure what else to say. 

For the most part, the duo had been moving rapidly toward normalcy. However, there was just something _off_. As if they were both afraid of being completely themselves, of sharing everything, of mentioning the green-eyed girl… afraid that they would fall apart again. 

They were treating resurrected friendship akin to a house of cards. One wrong touch, a breeze slightly too strong, and bam — cards on the floor.

It’s then that Tobin decides to bite the bullet and ask the question sitting on the tip of her tongue. She lays downs and takes a deep breath, looking up at the ceiling.

“Do you think we’ll ever be the same as before?”

Kelley turns her head from the top of her outstretched body to look at Tobin.

“I think so.”

They just lay in silence for a few moments, until Kelley speaks again.

“So you and Christen seemed to have gotten pretty close,” she speaks into the silence, presumably asking the question that had been sitting on the tip of _her_ tongue.

Tobin lets out a whispered chuckle, but she doesn’t say anything right away. She’s scared, to be honest.

“We should talk about it,” Kelley adds. 

“Close isn’t the right word for what we are at the moment.”

“What do you mean?” Kelley sits up and swings her legs into criss-cross applesauce, hands together in her lap.

Tobin takes a deep breath.

_Okay, so we’re doing this._

“I don’t mean this in a bad way, Kel, but sometimes I think I’m just another _you_ , you know? Another notch on the gay belt,” she says sadly, still staring at the ceiling.

Kelley laughs. “What a metaphor.”

“Whatever,” Tobin rolls her eyes slightly. “You know what I mean.”

“No, I dont,” Kelley says slowly, prompting Tobin to look over curiously. “Tobs, she didn’t look at me like… like she does at you.”

“Kel…” she breathes out, not wanting to start anything again, recognizing the conversation was reaching touchy area.

“It’s okay, Tobs. I think I knew it was over long before _that_ night,” she says neutrally.

“We have problematic taste in women, never ends well” is all Tobin decides to say in response, huffing a small laugh out for a moment.

“Don’t think yours is over yet.”

Tobin is quiet, not responding verbally, just nodding her head.

Kelley is carefully watching her, realizing in this moment how painful this whole thing has been for her best friend.

Of course, Kelley had an inkling of what it felt like to be under Christen’s spell — for lack of better words. But she could see how she has easily misjudged her best friend’s whole thing with the same girl. 

She was just so overtaken with emotion and heartache in the moment. When you’re desperately hanging on to something -- or _someone_ \-- by a thread for long enough, it almost hurts more to have that string be cut than it does to stay barely hanging on. And it all hurts more than if you would have just let go when you knew it was a lost cause in the first place.

Of course, it’s never as simple as that.

Someone has to teach you that in life either way, she supposes.

“I’m sorry,” Kelley confesses into the air. “I don’t think I’ve said it yet.”

“I’m sorry too.”

They entered into a comfortable silence after that, and Tobin feels like maybe that was what they needed to turn their house of cards to stone. 

____________________________

Many _wow_ ’s escaped the mouths of the UNC teammates when they arrived at the Mexican restaurant later that night. In front of them was a huge patio lit with Tiki torches, extending directly onto the Florida beach.

“Well this is just awesome,” Ashlyn had said.

Everyone around her nodded in agreement, before sitting down and starting to comb through the menu.

It was a game-day eve, so Heather and Yael had been very particular and _very clear_ about the “early night, healthy food, no alcohol” rules.

No one was frustrated about the rules, though. This game was important to everyone. And since it was against her previous alma mater, Stanford, it was _very_ important to Tobin.

Tobin, Kelley, and Ashlyn had ordered non-alcoholic beers and three large taco salads. They were making their way through them _very_ fast, with the goal of having time to chill by the water before the team had to head back to the hotel.

The three of them are at their own table, in the middle of a conversation about what junk foods they are planning to splurge on after the season is over, when Tobin cuts off in the middle of her sentence, eyes glued to something on the other side of the restaurant patio.

Looking down at her salad, Kelley obliviously picks up the conversation, ranting about these hot fries that she can’t wait to engulf.

Curious, Ashlyn follows Tobin’s eyes, seeing them focused on two girls, one sitting on top of the other, holding hands out on the table and laughing.

Tobin has gone pale in the face. 

And Ashlyn is just confused, still not comprehending why her friend looks like she has seen a ghost. She kicks Kelley’s leg under the table, which draws the girl’s attention away from the salad she’s been staring at while on her rant.

“What the hell was that for?” she whisper-yells toward Ashlyn, who just subtly points at Tobin with her thumb.

Kelley then repeats Ashlyn’s action from a few moments earlier, following Tobin’s eyesight across the room. But unlike Ashlyn, she sucks in a sharp breath upon doing so. 

She then proceeds to try to divert Tobin’s attention. However, it’s almost like her best friend can’t even hear her voice. 

_Of course this bitch is here_ , Kelley thinks.

Tobin’s just ... frozen ... staring at the two girls.

Ashlyn is just repeating Tobin’s name over and over again, trying to get her attention, and not really understanding how junk food put Tobin into some sort of dissociative state. 

“We should go down to the beach,” Kelley says suddenly, putting down her fork. 

“You’re only halfway done, though,” Ashlyn questions, still not understanding what’s going on. “And you’ve been talking about this taco salad since, like, the moment you laid eyes on the menu.”

Kelley is quiet for a second, and Ashlyn watches her scans the other side of the room with her eyes.

“What’re you looking for?”

“Alex,” Kelley responds pensively. “Ooh. There she is. Come with me,” she says as she drags Ashlyn away by the arm, leaving Tobin sitting alone at their small table. 

“Who the hell is Alex?” Ashlyn murmurs, as she’s dragged away.

With the three of them at their own table, it seems that no one else on the team even noticed the small commotion, or noticed Tobin staring, eyes wide open, across the room.

She watches as her ex-girlfriend picks up her hand, which is tightly entwined with the hand of her ex-roommate, and presses a kiss to the back.

Tobin is not sure what about the interaction made her react like this. She was over Shirley. Hell, she was so far over Shirley that she was under someone else every night. And at the same time, she was actively _craving_ to be under the green-eyed girl. It was a feeling of deep desire that never even compared to what she felt for Shirley. It was so much more.

But here she is, zoned out of the world around her, eyes on Shirley. Tunnel-vision.

And she feels her breathing-rate pick up.

And she’s taken back in time.

And just for a fleeting moment, she _feels_ what she felt that morning Shirley had ruined everything.

And she recognizes how similar it is to what she feels whenever she sees the green-eyed girl choose Brett.

And it’s all too much. 

The panic only lasts another minute, though, before she starts to register the feeling of fingertips tracing circles on the inside of her wrists, and her breathing starts to slow down. Blinking rapidly a few times and shaking her head, she’s brought out of her fugue state.

She’s both surprised and not surprised at all when she turns her head to the right and sees that Christen is the one who grounded her. 

“Hey there.”

“Hey,” Tobin returns. 

Christen’s fingers were still tracing over Tobin’s wrists. But then she felt them drag down the palms of her hands, long fingers intertwining with her own.

They stared at each other for a few seconds. Tobin’s wrists still burned where Christen’s fingers had been touching her. 

Her entire body ached for the girl. It was getting nearly impossible to deny it. 

To convince herself she was moving on. 

To convince herself she didn’t care.

To convince herself this girl wasn’t going to rip her apart just like Shirley did.

A tear starts to fall from her right eye, but it only makes it halfway down her cheek before an ice cold thumb is wiping it away, lingering on her cheek bone for a split second longer than necessary, before pulling away again.

It feels intimate. The two of them had not been _this_ close since the night Christen ran out of the room.

And she’s sucked into Christen’s alternate reality again. Forgetting that they were literally in the middle of a crowded restaurant. Forgetting the near panic attack she just had seen Shirley again for the first time. Forgetting how salty she is at the girl in front of her. Just lost in those green eyes. 

This was _different_.

Tobin palpibly felt the oxygen leaving her lungs in this moment, in how Christen stood her ground instead of shying away, in how her green eyes didn’t gloss over, in the realization that this aching was truly _not_ one-sided, in the realization that she is not just a notch on the gay belt. 

Just her luck, it’s at that moment that Kelley and Ashlyn return.

Neither of them particularly _like_ Christen at this moment in time. They just sort of stare at her until she feels Christen’s hands leave her own. 

The lost touch is really all she can focus on at the moment, until she’s nearly knocked over backwards as a pair of long arms wrap around her neck, and she’s confronted with a sweet and all-too-familiar smell.

_Alex_.

Tobin buries her head into her friend’s neck and smiles brightly.

But she’s still thinking about Christen. She’s thinking about everything left unsaid in that minute. And she’s thinking about everything her green eyes confessed.

It's uncertain. 

Risky. Dangerous. Unsafe. Unstable. 

To let herself fall again.

But this time, it was Tobin’s choice how this played out right now.

  
This could wait. Because she was back in one of Alex’s embraces. She felt safe and secure, and all she wanted was to go catch up with her best friend from Stanford.

So that’s what she did. She stood up, throwing her arm around Alex’s shoulders, walking straight past Christen, intentionally not looking down at her, following Kelley and Ashlyn, making her way to the beach.

The pull was too strong. 

Hazel eyes meet green eyes once more.

Until they’re out of sight. But not out of mind.

____________________________

  
  


Two hours later, Alex, Kelley, and Tobin are laying together on Kelley’s bed, Tobin sandwiched between the other two girls. 

They’d talked for a while on the beach, Kelley throwing her arm around Tobin’s shoulders as Alex updated them both on Shirley’s _activities_ since Tobin had left. 

Tobin had dozed off very shortly after they had returned to the hotel room, leaving Alex and Kelley to talk while she slept. She wakes up an hour later, rubbing her eyes as she comes back to life. 

Alex and Kelley pause their conversation about how much they hate their linguistics classes for a moment to look down at her.

“You okay champ?” Alex asks. 

“Yeah,” Tobin smiles, before looking around the room. “I think I’m gonna go take a shower.”

So that’s what she does, making her way over to the closet to grab a towel before disappearing into the bathroom near the front door of the hotel room.

The room is silent for a moment, Alex and Kelley both looking down at their hands.

“Uh, um, you want to chill and watch Neflix or something?” Kelley asks, finally breaking the silence. 

The corners of Alex’s mouth curl upwards as she looks at Kelley curiously. “Are you asking me to _netflix and chill_?”

Kelley chokes on air briefly, before coughing awkwardly and rushing to clarify. “No, no, just chilling. And watching netflix. Separately, but together. But not together. We can even watch Hulu instead!”

She seems to notice she’s rambling, cutting herself off when Alex’s smile shapeshifts into a smirk.

“That’s too bad.”

“Wh— what?”

Alex just laughs at how flustered she just made the cute girl sitting next to her. She’d met Kelley before -- several times, actually -- but she’s never gotten to be alone with her long enough to see what she’s all about. 

And tonight, she had decided that she kinda liked what Kelley was all about.

“Here, you pick,” she hands the remote to Kelley.

After a few minutes of scrolling, Kelley decides on Jurassic Park. The two of them settle back on the bed, trying to be subtle in moving closer to each other. 

It wasn’t subtle. 

Only ten minutes into the movie, a knock rings throughout the room.

Tobin’s still in the shower, so Alex and Kelley look at each other for a moment, Kelley pouting until Alex finally rolls her eyes and says “I got it.”

“No! You don’t have to!” Kelley fake protests.

“I got it,” Alex repeats pensively as she walks away. “But it means I get to pick out the next movie,” she calls out over her shoulder as she approaches the door.

“Hey, I never agreed to that!” she hears Kelley yell back.

Alex is laughing as she swings open the door, revealing a girl about her height. At first, she doesn’t recognize the girl in the door, whose head is hanging down. Then the girl tilts her head up and Alex sees bright green eyes.

And _Oh_. 

Tobin had described those eyes in so many words that Alex could practically write a novel about them. 

Alex’s laugh faded out a little. 

She knows who this is. She also knows the _torment_ this girl can cause. And she’s not quite sure what to make of her.

The girl just stands there for a moment, staring right into Alex.

Kelley seems to have noticed the change in tone, as she calls out “who is it, Alex?” and skips up behind Alex. She places her hands on Alex’s shoulders, popping herself up a little to look over them.

Then she sees Christen.

Now, Kelley may have worked things out with Tobin, but she’s not at all there yet with Christen. Her face molds into one of frustration. 

“Um, hi.”

Kelley just sighs. She’s not sure if Alex knows who this is, but she does seem to pick up on some weird tension in the doorway, so Kelley decides to just let her handle it.

Before either of them respond, the bathroom door opens and out comes an oblivious Tobin wrapped in just a towel.

They both see Christen follow her figure with her eyes and subconsciously lick her lips.

Kelley legitimately rolls her eyes and turns around to follow Tobin back into the room.

Alex shuts the door slightly, so that only she herself is visible in the doorway.

“Christen, right?” she says.

Her eyes go a little wide in surprise. “Uh, yeah.. Have we met?”

“No,” Alex laughs quietly. “Sorry, I’m Alex, I —”

“Played with Toby in California,” she finished quietly.

“Yeah.” Alex’s stoic face softens at the nickname that Tobin typically only lets people super close to her use. “I’ve heard about you too.”

“Oh.” Christen looks down and bites her lip. “I’d say ‘only good things I hope’, but …” she trails off.

Alex gives her a sympathetic smile. 

“Um…” she turns around to see Tobin and Kelley laughing at the screen where Jurassic Park is still playing. “Now’s not really a good time.”

Christen clearly sees through Alex’s facade and just nods. “My bad.”

She turns to walk away, but stops when she feels a hand on her shoulder.

“Tobs told me you’re a sucker for green tea. Unlike her, I have taste. Why don’t we go grab a cup of tea downstairs, yeah?”

Christen sucks in a deep breath. “Sure.”

____________________________

Alex walks back into the room forty-five minutes later, seeing Tobin and Kelley still sprawled out on the bed, now moved onto the second Jurassic Park movie.

“Hey guys,” she says as she walks over to the bed. “Scoot over, Kelley.”

Alex hops on the bed next to Kelley, letting the side of her body press up against Kelley’s side, in the same way they were laying before.

“Where’d you go, Lex?” Tobin asks curiously.

Kelley and Alex make brief eye contact, but it’s subtle enough that Tobin doesn’t notice.

“Just to get some fresh air,” she says quickly. “Long night, huh?”

“I honestly thought I wouldn’t care when I saw her again,” Tobin huffs out.

Kelley tentatively places her hand on Tobin’s leg. “The whole thing was a big bucket of suck.”

“So eloquent,” Alex quips.

Kelley elbows her in the side. “You’re ruining my supportive friend moment.”

“I think you did that to yourself, with your big bucket of suck.”

Kelley rolled her eyes, unable to suppress the smile taking over the lower half of her face.

Tobin raised an eyebrow at _whatever_ was happening right now. 

_This is FUN._

She makes a mental note to harrass them both later. 

“I’m glad you’re both here,” is all she says instead, unleashing smiles from everyone. They settle into a nice silence, the only sound in the hotel room being that of roaring dinosaurs originating from the flat screen television.

About a half-hour later, Tobin had fallen asleep _again_ in Kelley’s bed, and it was getting late — almost midnight, to be exact.

Kelley goes to tuck Tobin into her bed, Alex smiling sweetly at the action. She then shuts off the lamp, before walking Alex quietly to the door.

Alex is already through the door when she hears a “Wait” from the doorway behind her.

“Yeah?”

Kelley reaches to take the sharpie out of the cross-body bag slung over Alex’s shoulders, before taking Alex’s left hand in her own and scribbling 10 digits across the palm.

“To let me know whatever you said in your hour with Christen,” she pauses. “Or, you know, for whatever else you want.” 

They’re both smiling brilliantly as Alex strolls away.

___________________________

  
  


The game started out poorly. SO poorly.

Tobin felt like everyone was picking out _the_ wrong pass, herself included. And honestly, the energy out on the pitch was just not top notch.

She wasn’t sure if that was just her recovering from the night before, or whether everyone felt that way.

With that in mind, it was a _goddamn miracle_ that the game was still scoreless at the half. 

Sitting in the locker room at half time, Coach Doug just stood there silently.

And _that_ is when you know it’s bad. 

“I don’t even know what to say,” he had eventually said. “Do you want to be here? Do you want to win? Because I truly can’t tell.”

After a _very_ aggressive pep talk from the two captains, the team fanned out of the locker room to get ready for the second half. 

Thinking she’s the last one in the locker room, Tobin lays on her back across the bench and shuts her eyes, trying to psych herself up for a better second half performance. She’s utterly frustrated. 

Tobin’s startled by the sudden sound of cleats hitting the cement floor, indicating she’s not alone.

“Oh. Hey Tobin,” the green-eyed girl says as she finishes tying off the dutch braid she had clearly just redone.

Tobin opens her eyes to see Christen’s upside down face hanging over her. 

_Ah,_ she thinks to herself. Then, _she’s so pretty_.

“Hey,” she says casually, pushing herself up into a sitting position, legs on either side of the bench.

“You good?”

“We’re sucking out there right now,” Tobin says in a disappointed voice.

“Yeah, we are,” she hesitates as she looks at Tobin. 

Tobin stays quiet, with the feeling that Christen is about to say something more. “I didn’t get to talk to you again after last night.”

_There it is._

Christen cautiously takes a seat next to Tobin on the bench. She twists the end of her right braid as she nervously continues. “I was kinda worried about you.”

A skeptical look rushes across Tobin’s face, before it melts into a smirk.

“You were worried about me?”

“Don’t let it go to your head, Heath,” she says as she rolls her eyes at Tobin’s smirk.

Then Christen stands up and holds her hand out.

Tobin looks up for a moment and pauses. 

It’s just a hand. But it feels like an olive branch of sorts. 

_ok._

She holds out her hand, allowing herself to be pulled to her feet.

_ok._

When she tries to let go, Christen only tighten’s her grip, and she starts walking toward the door. 

_ok._

Green eyes glance hopefully at her as she turns around to back through the locker room door, tugging Tobin with her.

_ok._

Tobin’s surprised when Christen suddenly stops moving just a step through the door, and she hears the girl take a deep breath from where she stands, still facing the other way.

_ok_.

When Christen turns around, hopeful is gone. And in its place, there’s just pure want.

_ok_.

And then Christen’s taking steps forward.

_ok._

And Tobin’s taking steps backward.

_ok._

Then Tobin hits the wall. 

_ok._

But Christen’s still moving, until she’s fully pushed up against Tobin’s front.

_ok._

When Tobin goes to push her away, she feels strong hands pinning her wrists against the wall next to her body.

_ok._

And she lets them.

_ok_.

And then green eyes are looking at her lips, and the girl in front of her is speaking in a low voice. 

“You go straight to my head, Heath.”

_ok._

And the air has been sucked out of Tobin’s lungs. 

_ok._

And she licks her lips instinctively, watching as Christen’s eyes follow her tongue’s movement. 

_ok._

She feels frozen in place as Christen leans in slowly.

_ok._

She’s tuning out the voice that is approaching from the field-side of the tunnel, only focused on the way Christen looks like she wants to devour her. The space that yearns to be closed.

_ok._

“Chris?”

_ok._

And then she recognizes whose voice that is.

_not ok._

And then she sees him. 

_not ok._

And then she sees Christen recognize it too and pull back just a little.

_not ok._

She can see the wheels turning in Christen’s head, as if this decision is finally tangible, right here in this moment.

_not ok._

Then Christen drops her wrists and takes a step back from Tobin, head dropping to stare at the floor. 

_not ok._

Decision made. 

_not ok._

Tobin watches her for one more moment, before taking off down the tunnel, not even so much as looking at the tall, muscular football player standing in its wake.

_The half starts out not ok, too._

The play itself is leagues above where they were in the last half. Unfortunately, they just couldn’t seem to convert in the final third. 

Christen and Tobin were both on the field, and the tension between them was palpable to everyone.

It was still 0-0 in the 88th minute, when Tobin was dribbling up center field. The obvious pass was to her right, where Morgan was streaking into open space in front of her. But for some reason, Tobin still knew where Christen was without even looking. 

It was like a secret talent… or maybe a curse. 

She could still _feel_ her. 

Enacting a quick stepover, Tobin was facing back toward her own half, but only for a moment before she hit the ball blindly with her heel through the two players behind her, and behind the back line to the left side, where Christen was streaking up from her defensive positioning.

Christen was maybe 5 yards out of the eighteen when she came into contact with the ball, touching it once with the outside of her right foot, not even needing to look up as she suddently struck the ball with a complete follow through.

Tobin knew it was going in as soon as she heard the sound Christen’s cleat made when it hit the sweet spot on the ball. 

Christen was a _ruthless_ finisher. And just like all aspects of her persona, her secret weapon was how unexpected her game always was.

She smiles at the ground for a minute as the ball hits the back of the net -- it _was_ a beautiful one -- before looking back up to see the green-eyed girl running at her full-speed.

A moment later, she’s crashing into Tobin with almighty force, wrapping her arms tightly around her neck, as Tobin’s arms close securely around her waist.

And Tobin is breathing her in. But she’s not smiling anymore. 

Her entire body tenses up when she sees Brett jumping up and down on the sideline, arms raised in the air. And she knows Christen felt it too.

They’re swarmed by teammates just a moment later, but the two of them stay slot tightly together in the middle of the huge group hug.

Then Tobin feels lips press gently against her neck, as Christen whispers so that only she can hear. “I didn’t know he was here.”

And Tobin’s internally rolling her eyes at the words left unspoken, and then she lets go of Christen entirely.

She truthfully doesn’t know what to believe anymore. Once again, Christen gets close just to drop a bomb and pull away, back to him. “Sure you didn’t.”

The energy from the goal carried UNC through the rest of the game, defeating the #1 seeded team 1-0 and putting themselves in first place.

When the game was over, Tobin was happily walking around the field, hugging old friends and teammates that she hadn’t seen in nearly half-a-year. She somehow manages to not run into Shirley, thankfully. Eventually, she spots her blonde friend smiling at her from across the field, hands on her hips.

She’s quickly jogging over to her just a moment later, engulfing her in a big hug and swaying them back and forth.

“Tobin!” Jackie squealed. “You guys killed that!”

Tobin just laughed. 

“The goal was beautiful,” Jackie added.

Tobin thought back over the Christen’s goal, the way her eyes lit up and the smile made it all the way up to her eyes too.

“Yeah, she’s beautiful.” Tobin backtracks quickly. “I meant yeah, it was a good one.”

_Shit._

Jackie’s just looking at her knowingly.

“Tobs, cut the crap, she _is_ beautiful. Would you relax,” she slaps Tobin in the shoulder as they start walking toward the sideline. 

“He’s here,” she just returns, a frown on her face.

She slaps Tobin’s shoulder again, harder this time. “Woah, woah, woah. NO frowns allowed when you just schooled the number one team.”

“Fine,” she replies, the girl’s enthusiasm starting to make her smile.

“There we go! I’ll totally help you with her tonight, by the way. You’ll just owe me some help back,” she smiled mischeviously.

“Jax, I _help_ you like every day,” Tobin says, joking back with a smirk.

“Ew, not like that!”

“Ew?” Tobin asks in surprise offense at her word choice. 

Jackie throws her head back laughing. “Shut up and maybe I’ll _help_ you back at the hotel before we go out.”

Tobin rolls her eyes as she throws her arm around her sassy friend and starts to walk her off the field. “You’re a piece of work, you know that?”

____________________________

Since UNC won the game that morning, they were granted a bye for the following day, alongside Stanford, since they were seeded #1. So the whole UNC team decided to go out and hit up a local club together that night.

Tobin had gone over to Jackie’s hotel to ~hang out~ for an hour or two, before returning to the team’s hotel.

They’d started getting ready pretty early — Tobin settling on her classic black ripped jeans, high top sneakers, and white t-shirt look —, before Alex and a few of Tobin’s friends from Stanford had come over to her and Kelley’s hotel room to pregame before going out.

Everyone is just hanging around, drinking and talking, when Tobin’s phone buzzes with a message. 

**9:01 p.m. Jax: come get me hottie lamottie, I’m in the lobby**

“Guysss! Jackie’s here, I’ll be back in five,” she announces, before heading toward the door.

Their room is up on the 11th floor, so she heads for the elevator, impatiently tapping her foot as she waits. 

When the elevator doors open, Tobin throws her head back laughing at the sight before her. Because there, standing in front of her, is Christen in just a bikini, clearly coming from swimming somewhere.

_Just when I thought we were getting along again, Universe._

Tobin slides her hands into the pockets of her skinny jeans and bites her lip, before slowly pacing into the elevator, not stopping until she’s leaning against the back wall, a few feet behind Christen. 

She doesn’t say anything, but she’s still smiling to herself quietly.

“What are you doing in here?” Christen asks suddenly. 

She sees Christen watching her body shift positions through the reflection in the elevator door. 

“Don’t come any closer,” Christen weakly threatens, raising a hair clip defensively.

Tobin’s laughing at this entire situation. “I don’t think that’s gonna injure anyone.”

“Depends where I put it,” Christen quips back. “You won’t see it coming.”

Tobin’s eyes not-so-subtly slowly scan up and down Christen’s bare, sculpted body, only covered by a thin, black strappy bikini.

“Don’t think you have too many places to hide it there, Chris,” she jokes, drawing her bottom lip between her teeth. 

Christen turns around to face her at that comment, an adorably frustrated pinch on her face.

“Someone took my towel,” she mumbled angrily. “And my room key.”

“You went swimming before we’re going out?” She raises an eyebrow, teasing the girl.

“Well done, Sherlock. Were you following me?”

“Actually, I’m just going downstairs to grab something,” Tobin shakes her head. “Don’t flatter yourself. Some of us respect boundaries.”

“Am I supposed to congratulate you?” Christen jabs sarcastically, before turning back around to face the elevator door and bringing her arms crossed against her abdomen.

She’s not sure what makes her do it -- whether she’s drunk from the three shots of vodka she’d taken in the hotel room, or whether she’s just drunk on Christen’s body. But Tobin takes two steps forward in that moment, situating herself against Christen’s mostly bare back, leaning into her ear to whisper. 

“If you want to.”

She smirks as she hears Christen’s breath hitch in her throat. 

Christen doesn’t respond, and Tobin lets her lips brush over the back of the girl’s ear.

She carefully moves her hands to Christen’s hips from behind, sliding her fingers under the sides of her strappy bikini, then moving her mouth to bite Christen’s earlobe gently. 

“What do you want, Chris?” she continues to whisper, her state of drunkenness making her a little bold. 

At the same time, it’s the only question she’s wanted to ask the girl for, like, two months now.

The green-eyed girl closes her eyes and lets out a soft whine at Tobin’s question, and Tobin feels it shoot straight to her core.

_Ding_ \- _Ding!_

Tobin drags her fingers out from under Christen’s bikini bottom, letting them trace up her sides for a few seconds, tracing her curves, before she leans in just one more time.

“Tell your boyfriend I say hi.”

And with that, she shoves her hands back in her pockets and walks out of the elevator smiling widely, leaving a very flustered Christen behind. 

____________________________

A half-hour later, they’re walking down the street from the hotel to the club, when the group hears a high pitched scream, bringing them all to a halt.

Tobin is arm-in-arm with Jackie, who flinches very noticeably at the sound. 

“What the hell was that?” Jackie asked. 

“You’re jumpy,” Tobin laughs back at her reaction, earning her an eye roll.

Suddenly, they see a brunette figure sprinting toward the group from the opposite direction, and soon enough Ashlyn is running away from them. 

She hasn’t seen Ali in two days.

“Get a room!” Kelley yells as the two appear to be nearly mauling each other.

Jackie just laughs lightly and drags Tobin by the hand inside the club. 

The club is _popping_ , very dark, with red-colored lights giving the entire room a dark, red cue. There’s a circular bar in the center of the room, booths and pool tables to the left of the bar, and a _huge_ dance floor to the right of the bar. There’s a huge crowd of people, and Jackie holds onto her hand tightly as they make their way to the bar. 

“Alright Tobs, what am I getting you?” she shouts over the music. 

Tobin opens her mouth to answer, but Jackie cuts her off.

“And don’t say beer. We’re celebrating, go next-level.”

Tobin groans. “Fine. Can I get a whiskey sour, two cherries.”

“Oh damn, she _fancy_.”

“Oh shut up Jax, I’ll be over there,” Tobin yells, pointing toward the booth in the back where some of their friends had sat down.

Jackie gives her a thumbs up, turning back toward the bar, raising her arm to signal the bartender over.

Tobin weaves through the crowd until she arrives at the circular booth, sliding in the side next to Kelley and Alex, who, might she add, seem to think their hand-holding under the table is _subtle_. 

She’s deep in conversation about winter-break plans with Kelley when Jackie returns, deciding to sit horizontally with her legs over Tobin’s lap.

“What on earth is that?” Tobin asks about Jackie’s pink-colored drink as she takes the other glass, with what she assumes is Whiskey inside from Jackie’s hand.

“A cosmo, dummy,” she replies as if it's obvious.

Tobin just keeps looking at her.

“Hey, you made me drink that licorice-flavored seltzer thing last week. Do _NOT_ come hating on my cosmo.”

Tobin holds her hands up and smiles, admitting defeat, before picking her drink off the table again.

She was glad Jackie came out with them tonight. Much like Kelley, the girl just knew how to have a good time. And Tobin was also terrified to see Christen alone after their elevator interaction, so Jackie was the loveliest of buffers (once again).

They’re just talking about Florida, as Jackie just grabs one cherry from Tobin’s glass and sucks it off the stem with a pop, before smiling mischeviously down at Tobin.

Tobin’s smiling back as she speaks, but that quickly turns into a grimace when she feels a foot hit her shin under the table. She’s about to stop and ask who did that, when she sees Alex staring at her with wide eyes, motioning to the right of the table with her head. 

Surely enough, when she turns her head she sees Christen approaching the table, Brett following closely behind. 

_Fuck me._

The girl smiles as everyone mumbles “hey Christen!” to her. But Christen seems to only be paying attention to one person, her eyes settling on Tobin and the blonde girl in her lap. 

Tobin just leans back, letting her arms rest along the top of the booth on both sides of her, as she holds eye contact with Christen for a moment. 

Jackie leans into her ear, laughing. “Dude, she’s so jealous.”

Christen’s face hardens at the interaction.

And Tobin’s still feeling a little bold. And she’s vibing off of this jealous energy.

So she removes one of her arms from the top of the booth behind her to pick up the other cherry from her Whiskey glass. 

Staring straight into Christen’s eyes, she laps her tongue around the cherry once, before popping the entire thing -- stem included -- into her mouth. 

She takes that same arm, and uses it to tilt Jackies chin toward her, and then breaks eye contact to kiss her deeply.

Groans erupt from around the table.

The two of them break away just a moment later when Jackie pulls back, smiling at her. 

And Tobin sees out of the corner of her eye that Christen hasn’t even moved an inch, green eyes still boring into her. 

She watches knowingly as Jackie’s smile soon turns into an expression of confusion, before turning back to meet Christen’s eyes again, a small smirk playing on her lips.

Bringing her fingers up to her mouth, Jackie pulls out a cherry stem tied perfectly in a knot, and her jaw opens wide as she places it on the table in front of her. 

And her friends around the table let out a chorus of “Ahhh” and “Damn Tobs.”

And Jackie’s leaning into her ear to whisper “okay, that was hot.”

And Christen is taking a big gulp as she looks down at the knot, before raising her eyes to meet Tobin’s again.

And Tobin is slouched and leaning back in the booth, her tongue coming out to lick her lips once as she stares back at Christen confidently. 

Underneath her strong exterior, Tobin was feeling _very_ weak in the face of Christen’s beauty. She was breathtaking in an oversized pastel pink t-shirt that hung like a very short dress with no pants underneath, showing off her long, toned legs -- the whole sorority t-shirt look was _doing_ something to Tobin. Her hair is down in wild curls, and she’s wearing just a touch of makeup that accentuates her already beautiful features.

But Tobin now _knows_ the effect she has on the green-eyed girl. And then she takes control of the moment, looking away from Christen’s eyes.

_Mhm._

“You’re the devil,” Jackie says quietly to Tobin, just loud enough for her to hear over the blaring music, before they both return their attention to the conversation at the table.

Tobin can still _feel_ Christen’s eyes on her after that, as usual.

In fact, she can feel Christen watching her _all night_. 

And the club is hot and crowded and sweaty, but the way Christen’s eyes traced over her body repeatedly and not at all subtly made her feel hot and sweaty for a whole different reason.

But Tobin keeps her distance.

It’s not until later that night, when Jackie and Tobin are up at the bar waiting on refills, that she sees Christen’s arms laced around _his_ neck on the other side of the bar.

She rolls her eyes and looks down at the bar table. It seems that Jackie noticed Christen’s whereabouts as well, as she nudged Tobin’s shoulder and gave her a sympathetic smile.

Yet once again, when she picks her head up, Christen is straight at her from across the bar.

_I can’t take this._

So she leans in close, letting her lips ghost Jackie’s ear as she maintains eye contact with Christen, whispering, “let’s dance.”

Walking out onto the dance floor, they find a free pocket of space in between the many groups of people.

Tobin twirls Jackie around once before pulling her closer and settling her hands on the girl’s waist.

They’re swaying closely together and chatting intermittently, when Tobin sees Christen also make her way out onto the dance floor out of the corner of her eye. 

_Challenge accepted_.

And the next 15 minutes were like a fever dream underneath the flashing red light that flooded the dance floor.

_Tobin_ pulls Jackie closer.

_Christen_ pulls Brett’s hands around her waist from behind her. 

_Tobin_ rests her forehead against Jackie’s.

_Christen_ starts moving her hips in rhythm with Brett’s.

_Tobin_ moves her hands down to grab Jackie’s ass. 

_Christen_ loops her arms around Brett’s neck behind her, swaying her hips in time with his.

_Tobin_ lets her eyes roll back into her head as Jackie sucks at her neck.

_Christen_ shimmies seductively down to the floor and back up again.

_Tobin_ scratches at Jackie’s upper thighs.

_Christen_ uses her hands to push herself back into Brett’s pelvis.

_Tobin_ looks at Christen.

_Christen_ looks at Tobin.

  
  


And they stay like that.

_And they stay like that_.

They’re watching each other, talking to each other through their stare, as the music pounds loudly around them.

Until Christen breaks eye contact to look over her shoulder and whisper something into Brett’s ear. Tobin sees him nod back at her, before releasing his hands from her lower waist and walking toward the bar.

Then Green eyes are staring at her again.

Taunting her.

Challenging her.

Daring her.

Green eyes backing away slowly.

Desperation.

Desire.

_Want_.

And then Christen is turning around, walking quickly toward the bathroom.

And Tobin soon finds herself following in that same direction with the same excuse.

Hazel eyes hurrying toward the back of a club with a purpose.

Hazel eyes bursting through the door.

Hazel eyes locking on Green eyes one more time.

A wish.

A confession.

A promise.

“Tobin, we need to talk. I —”

But she’s cut off before she can continue by Tobin’s lips pressing hard against hers, forcing her back against the back wall of a women’s bathroom with a slam, before Tobin pulls back just enough to whisper against Christen’s lips.

“I don’t fucking want to talk anymore.”

____________________________

In the three weeks following the Midweek Mayhem party, three things happened. 

But the best was yet to come.


	6. the same one you wore when we were

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A look in the rearview mirror (Christen’s pov).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the wait, y’all! College semester is starting to get a little crazy. Hopefully these two (very long lol) chapters make up for it and hold you over for a little bit. :) 
> 
> And hopefully this elucidates what’s been goin on in Christen-land this whole time.
> 
> Thanks again for reading. Let me know your thoughts, and hope you’re all having a lovely week!

Christen Press considered herself a pretty decent person. 

She said hello to the cashier at the grocery store. She held the door open for strangers behind her. She volunteered twice a week at the local free clinic. She treated people with respect. She listened to others. 

But a total angel? Far from it.

And if anything were to make an argument for the existence of karma, it would be the past 365 days.

If you had asked her a year ago what she thought her life would be like this November, whatever sort of strange concoction of reality she is currently living in would not have made the realm of possibilities. 

This doubt in her relationship with Brett.

This sense of regret for not spending more time with her mother. 

This severance of her friendship with Kelley.

This pure want of the tan-skinned girl who slept in what was supposed to be her dorm. 

This … pervasive sense of uncertainty.

Every decision she makes seems to exacerbate some existing problem. And it’s hard to complain when, somehow, she’s become the villain. Christen’s not trying to make excuses, but honestly she’s not sure how any of it happened. 

So here she is on a cool Saturday morning in late November, in the back of a silver 2009 Toyota Corolla, midway through an uber ride to a Starbucks on the other side of their college town. 

Because she’s a coffee addict. 

Because she can’t just grab coffee on campus anymore. 

Because then she’d run into Jackie. 

And she’s all blonde, and smiling, and touching Tobin’s arms, and it puts an indescribable feeling deep in the pit of Christen’s stomach. One she doesn’t want to consciously overanalyze, probably because her subsconscious brain has already torn it to shreds. 

In fact, Tobin’s entire existence has been kind of like a surprise sucker punch to the gut. 

It’s as if Christen is constantly freezing in her world, and the hazel-eyed girl is a warm fire. 

Too far away -- freeze to death. Too close to her -- suffocates from smoke inhalation. 

Neither option allows her to breathe, and she just can’t for the life of her seem to find the line lying in between the two. 

So she chose the (ill-advised) third option: doing her very best to avoid all things Tobin. All things involving _feeling_ , really.

And at first that was going okay. She started sleeping over at Kelley’s most nights of the week, and Brett filled in the rest of those. She started studying organic chemistry so much that she actually had an ‘A’ in the class—who would’ve thought. She called her family every single day. She started picking up the Friday morning shift at the clinic too, since she _knew_ Tobin had class at that time. She almost exclusively hung out with Ali and the lacrosse team when she wasn’t with Kelley or Brett. She read all of Crime and Punishment (twice).

But then her Mom got told that she had six months to live. 

And Brett told her that she had “become an emotional gravestone.”

And Kelley said she was in love with her. 

And Christen couldn’t seem to take her eyes off of Tobin long enough to even think about any of it.

And she was terrified. 

Terrified to move in any direction, to make a decision, to breathe. 

So, yes, she’s chosen the path of avoidance. Hence why she is currently stepping out of a ten-dollar uber ride to buy an overpriced latte that won’t taste nearly as good as the free one she could have gotten from a five minute walk from her dorm room.

And also yes, she had actually been in her dorm room last night. Sort of, anyway. 

And oh lord, did Christen _need_ coffee right now.

Making her way through the door of Starbucks, she was mentally justifying her overpriced latte to herself. Brett had been cheating on her for months, and her Mom was barely leaving the hospital anymore, and Kelley was no longer speaking to her, and because she had kissed Tobin last night. 

She had _kissed_ Tobin last night.

Tobin who had become her best friend. 

Tobin who was like being wrapped in a blanket of security.

Tobin who made her feel so special.

Tobin who lights her body on fire.

But then, she ran.

Broken down, red eyes, tears falling, knees giving out, emotions scattered throughout the air as if her brain had just shot them out in a confetti cannon. She hadn’t planned on going back to the room after that fight with Brett, in the first place. The fight where he told her he had been fucking someone else since homecoming. And she knows she’s sort of being a hypocrite, given that she let him give her the go to hook up with girls. And she knows that he had a point about the candelit sushi situation he walked into (not that she would admit it). 

Again, she couldn’t explain it. 

Couldn’t explain why it made her so angry that he did that, couldn’t explain why she went back. Couldn’t explain literally anything in her life right now. It was as if she was an imposter, looking in from the outside, unable to actually control the things that happened to her corporeal form. Unable to explain _Tobin_.

It had started out as this sort of infatuation. But then everyone else seemed to shun both her and Tobin, and they just fell into each other in a way that she couldn’t quite explain and in a way that she couldn’t prevent. Kinda like their friends just threw them in their trash can. It sounds bad, in theory. But the company in there itself wasn’t bad at all. 

Her and Tobin found each other in the trash can.

Is Christen going crazy? Maybe.

Then all of a sudden there was this weight to the trash can air that she’d never felt before. Especially not with a girl.

Hell, she’d been curious. That’s what Kelley was for. It started out as a drunk threesome with Brett. It’s not like her and Brett were struggling in that department or anything. Christen had been told numerous times that she was bold in bed, fearlessly herself, and she knew that she exuded a type of false confidence on the daily, one that let her tackle new things, melt into her curiosities, in a way that usually lacked consequences or at least escaped obvious judgement from her peers. 

So she fucked Kelley. Because she was curious. Because Kelley looked at her like she was a dessert. And because it was new, and intriguing, and uncomfortable, really. 

Brett and Christen had always connected on a whole other level, and she’d never felt less than comfortable with him. To most people, that consistent comfort is probably the dream. To Christen, it felt like the yellow brick road to boredom and complacency. 

And as Benjamin E. Mays once said, “The tragedy of life is not found in failure, but in complacency.” 

It’s not like Christen _liked_ failure, but at least she always gained something from the discomfort. It made her feel lived. 

Right now, however, Christen was beginning to feel this overwhelming sense of complacency with him. Freshman year, Brett had quickly become her closest friend and supporter, and she’d _loved_ him uninterrupted since then. That wasn’t the issue. 

At some point in those near-three years, love had turned to _in love_ for him, and she just kept telling herself that if she gave it time, she’d catch up with his feelings. After all, he’s theoretically the perfect guy — fits right in with her family, comes to all her sports games, whispers sweet nothings in her ear constantly, shows her off to his friends, respects how much time she wants to put toward school. Yet, Christen felt like she was always stalling with him, waiting for her mind and heart to get on the same wavelength. 

They just never seemed to get there. And Christen’s not exactly a patient person.

Then again, what if she was waiting for something that just isn’t going to happen?

The anticipation, the longing, the effervescent waiting game — it’s the foundation of settling, something so incredibly against the fundamentals of Christen’s being. Something so complacent. 

Kelley herself wasn’t supposed to turn into anything more than working out her kinks and compulsive curiosities so that she could get rid of this feeling that something was ‘off’ in her relationship with Brett. But when Kelley had touched her, she felt it shoot through her entire body. It was absolutely electric. And she needed to feel that again. She actively craved it. It was something she had _never_ , not once, felt with him. Sure, they had sex all the time. And he was good in bed, he always made her come. But it was almost as if she was sleeping with him because they were dating and felt like she had to. She didn’t have to keep sleeping with Kelley. The difference was that she wanted to.

So Christen asked him one night, if she could keep hooking up with Kelley, on her own. He was confused, but his lack of concern or care confused Christen even more.

 _”C, you’re not gay,”_ he had laughed out.

_”Yeah I know. It’s just for fun.”_

And, well, Christen couldn’t have agreed to that statement quicker. She wasn’t gay. Of course not. She was just “doing college.” Surprisingly, her boyfriend seemed to buy that without further question. Because her hooking up with Kelley was hot, or some other bullshit she wasn’t going to argue with.

Because she _wanted_ to feel Kelley’s skin on hers again.

If her friends had to describe Christen in one sentence, they’d probably say she’s bold, a little insane, but never uninteresting. 

When she felt something — when she _wanted_ something — she made it happen. She was spontaneous and a little bit of a flirt, but that’s just what added spice to her life. And she tended to seek out people who were similar to herself in that regard. Like Kelley (like Tobin).

It had been months of hooking up with Kelley — nearly a year, in actuality — when the girl had confronted her unexpectedly.

_“I don’t know, I feel different with you, I guess. He’s just… there,” Christen breathed into the air one night on the 180, taking a glug from the almost-empty handle of Bacardi they were sharing._

_“Then why are you even with him?”_

_She dreaded this question, but she can’t admit that it hadn’t been crossing her mind lately._

_“Because he loves me.”_

_“Well I love you.”_

_Line crossed._

_“Kelley...I’m straight.”_

And she knew that had to hurt. And at this point, she also knew deep down that it wasn’t true.

Christen understood why Kelley cut her out. They’d been walking this pathway to crash-and-burns-ville for way too long, and they were going to have to get there eventually. She herself had started pulling away from the girl when she realized that people maybe _knew_. When teammates came up to her and told her that they would be cute together. When Ashlyn winked at her knowingly everytime she was leaving the soccer house at night. When it started to seem like more than consistent, casual hook-ups with her best friend.

But she also knew that she didn’t love Kelley like that. She couldn’t. She wasn’t willing to deal with it all at the time. And Kelley didn’t really give her the time to, or enough of a reason to, if she were being honest. 

Then Tobin Heath entered the game. And it may sound the same as Kelley, in the grand scheme of things. 

It wasn’t. 

When she had first found out she was rooming with Tobin, she had rolled her eyes so hard. The girl had a reputation — not necessarily a flattering one — and she wasn’t looking forward to dealing with being sexiled from her room every other day. Christen herself knew better than to listen to stories told down the grapevine in that sense. But she had a more reliable source at the time: Kelley. 

She was wrong, though. Tobin was unprecedented, unexpected. She didn’t expect to get addicted to those hazel eyes. She didn’t expect to feel her stomach twist when Tobin paid her a compliment. She didn’t expect for her body to burn in the absence of her touch. She didn’t expect to connect so fast with the girl, and to become nearly best friends in two weeks. She didn’t expect there to be so much more to Tobin Heath.

Unlike Kelley, being in Tobin’s arms, holding on tight, breathing her in, it made her feel calmer, rather than terrified. So when she had that huge fight with Brett, it’s no wonder that her mind brought her body back to Tobin.

Maybe her mind and heart were still not connected at all. 

All she wanted in that moment was to feel better. For Tobin to be touching her everywhere, providing the burning sensation that she knew would overpower the pain coming from other people and other places.

No one had ever controlled Christen’s emotions before, made her feel like that. 

So she had kissed Tobin last night. 

Because just for one night, she wanted to forget about everything and have all of Tobin, and nothing else.

For the first time in 365 days, she wanted to feel safe.

And she didn’t want to talk about it. Not even a little bit, because that would ruin it. 

She thought her best friend would give her that simple relief. Would let her cross that line, just for one night.

And suddenly, lips in front of Tobin’s, body pressed into hers, she recognized the gravity of the situation. This wasn’t something she had vetted with Brett, like Kelley. This wasn’t one of the girls she would never see again after that night. This was the person she talked to all day, every day. This was someone she would have to face again. 

She watched as Tobin’s hands slowly traced the angle of her jaw, and the intensity and emotion behind those hazel eyes. She saw the raw _want_. And she knew. 

This couldn’t just be crossing the line for one night.

Tobin wanted more than Christen could give right now. 

And Tobin clearly wasn’t going to just give her physical relief. 

And it was no longer simple.

And it was embarrassing. 

And Christen didn’t fucking want _this_ right now. 

She couldn’t take it. 

So she ran out. She ran all the way to Brett’s apartment. And he may have just given her the physical relief she needed, but Christen couldn’t get the hazel-eyed girl out of her mind the entire time.

And it was while laying underneath her boyfriend that she realized there was always _something_ missing with him. That the _something_ “off” could not be fixed. And maybe, just maybe, that _something_ missing was in her own ability to love him back.

And well, my golly. That was too much for tonight.

So once again, she ran.

She ran back to their dorm room, and she crawled into bed next to a sleeping Tobin. A sleeping Tobin that couldn’t ask for more than she was able to give. And she finally felt safe. 

Until she woke up at 6:15 a.m. and realized that she could not deal with a confrontation with Tobin right now. She realized she had fucked it all up. 

So for the third time in a twelve-hour span, she ran. 

And now she’s pulling her laptop out in the downtown Starbucks, hoping to distract herself, and also hoping to somehow become invisible. Hoping to disappear into thin air. Sitting there, she’s really just trying to figure out how to go on, because she’s eventually going to have to go back to campus and face the wrath she left behind. 

Yeah, she’s going a little insane right now. Adding coffee into the equation was, in retrospect, probably not the best idea.

She checks her phone for the first time that morning.

**14 unread messages**

Kelley’s house — her previous safe haven — is out of the picture, as it had been since that night on the 180 nearly 3 months ago. She could go to her dorm room, but Tobin’s there. So no, she couldn’t go to her dorm room. And with the amount of lowkey angry texts from Brett, that isn’t someplace she can go either right now. At least, not for peace and quiet. 

The feeling engulfing her right now is fear. And that’s not exactly unfamiliar to her. It used to be because everything was so perfect and she didn’t want to mess it up. But now it’s not that at all. 

Everything _is_ messed up. 

And Christen’s scared she can’t fix it. And she’s scared because she can’t bear losing any more. And she’s suddenly so scared of those hazel eyes that are the one thing that makes her feel safe. Does that make any sense? Not at all. But that’s how everything feels.

She’s deep in her thoughts, when a coffee slamming down on the table in front of her snaps her out of her head.

“Fancy seeing you here Chris, what’s up?”

“Oh, hey Ali, just … um … getting some work done.”

Ali just stares back at her as if to say _really_.

“What’re you doing here?” Christen adds on, ignoring her friend’s stare. 

“I saw Tobin this morning.”

Christen doesn’t say anything in response, adjusting looking down at her laptop pretending to be typing, before Ali shuts her screen from behind and sits down at the table across from her friend. Christen just keeps staring at the top of her laptop.

“You always come here when you run.”

She takes a breath and looks up at her friend.

“Well you win, you caught me. Do you need something else?”

Ali rolls her eyes at her friend’s short tone.

“It’s not a game, dude. I just wanted to make sure you’re good.”

“I don’t really want to talk about it.”

“Yeah, I didn’t come here to talk to you.”

Christen’s eyebrows furrow.

“I know you a little, Chris,” she lets on a small smile.

“So….”

“So what?”

“Why did you come then?”

“OH! We’re going shopping for the big party that’s in like three weeks. I’m fueling your anxious avoidance.”

Christen immediately shoves her laptop in her bag and looks up to the sky.

“Oh thank god. I need some retail fucking therapy,” she groans out as she stands up.

She grabs her coffee in one hand, using the other to push the chair into the table before slinging her backpack over her shoulder and beginning to walk away with Ali. They had just exited the shop, when she realizes she has not a clue what party Ali was referring to.

“Wait what party?”

“Midweek Mayhem?” Ali states like it's obvious. 

“Oh not gonna lie, I forgot about that,” Christen laughs as her eyes go wide in recognition. 

“You’ve been busy my friend,” Ali replies knowingly, slinging her arm around Christen’s shoulders as they walk down the college-town sidewalk. 

Christen just throws her head back, yelling out, “UGH I need a DRINK,” attracting the attention of the other people walking down the sidewalk.

But that’s just how Christen is, and Ali is laughing with her shortly after. “Don’t we ALL.”

________________________________________________________

By the time that Wednesday rolled around, Christen had one too many make-up conversations with Brett. They’d said “sorry” and “I love you” and all the necessary items. But for the first time, she wasn’t sure she meant any of it at all, not even a little bit.

But at this point, she sure as hell was not showing up to that party alone. And Ali was going with Ashlyn and Tobin. And she had no one else. And he was comfortable. 

She knows that’s a bad reason to tell someone that she loves them. She knows. 

They were late. 

“B, can you carry me?” she pouts.

“Do you want my drunk self to drop you?” he returns, raising an eyebrow. 

“Hey, don’t answer my question with a question. I’m tired.”

“We’re not even inside yet,” Brett says while rolling his eyes and gesturing to the front door of the soccer house, just a few feet in front of where they are standing while having this conversation.

Christen just purses her lips and opens her eyes wide.

“Fine, you’re such a pain in the ass Chrissy. Lucky you’re cute.”

“Suck my tit, B,” she returns snarkily as she smiles widely and jumps on his back.

“I will later,” he smirks as he opens the doors and walks inside.

She slaps him hard in the arm at that comment, before looking up to scope out the party scene. 

There was a makeshift dance floor to the left, not a single person in sight without a red solo cup in hand, and the house was lit up with only dark blue LED lights. The music was blaring so loud that she couldn’t hear whatever Brett had just turned his head slightly to say to her.

“WHAT?” she yells back, before tightening her grip around his neck from behind and leaning her head closer.

“Wanna just go chill outside? Dylan says there’s a fire pit out back.”

“Yeah sure. Can we stop in the kitchen to get some lemonade for these nips?” she yells back, pulling out the four nips of tequila from her side pocket and shaking them in front of his face for a moment.

“Your wish is my command.”

They make their way through the crowd, Christen holding tight to his shoulders, the both of them bouncing to the music and stopping for short conversations as they make their way toward the kitchen.

The two of them together had always been a pair to remember. Star linebacker meets above average soccer forward. It’s not exactly the “quarterback and face of the soccer team” dream couple, but it’s close enough, and a lot of people were jealous of them. At the same time, everyone wanted to _know_ them. It had been this way since they had started dating freshman year, everyone looking at them from the outside as if they were perfect, and everyone wanting to be friends with them. 

Walking through this party, engaging with people and laughing on Brett’s back, it all felt so familiar. Yet, something in her felt almost unsettled today by the stark normalcy of it all. It reminded her of a life before her _thing_ with Kelley, a life before Tobin in her entirety, something so utterly unfamiliar to her now.

It’s only a moment later, when Christen turns her head to look through the archway into the kitchen, where hazel eyes are standing just centimeters away from brown eyes, lips curled into smiles as the two girls in the kitchen are staring at each other, that the smile drops off her face and she yanks Brett by the collar of his shirt. 

“Yo what was that for?”

She whips out one nip, takes off the cap, throws it to the side, and flips her head toward the sky as she chugs the nip. Christen wipes her mouth on her wrist and throws the bottle off in the similar direction.

Brett just laughs and licks his lips. “You’re hot.”

“I know.”

She settles her arms around his neck and leans down to his ear. “Don’t need lemonade, let’s just go outside the other back door.”

“Uh you sure? We can stop?”

“Yeah, let’s go,” she shouts. But as he starts walking, she makes the mistake of letting her eyes wander back into the kitchen, where the two girls are entangled with each other, nearly sucking each other’s faces off. She feels a new feeling develop deep within her, something eerily close to jealousy.

Her and Brett spend another hour or two cuddled up by the fire, Christen having easily gone through her four nips of tequila early on. She’s caught up in her thoughts, unable to get the image of Tobin and Jackie out of her brain. And she’s drunk as day. So when she sees people through the window start siphoning into a side hallway, and sees Ali giving her a beckoning wave, she happily yanks Brett up by the arm and drags him to the nextdoor lounge room, not even bothering to look at him or say a single word as she shoves him down into the loveseat and sits in front of him, leaning back on his legs. 

Truth or Dare had always been one of her favorite party games. The risqué energy that radiated from the game charged her up, essentially lying parallel to her bold yet spontaneous nature. The team had picked up on this throughout the past three years, and as such, they always tried to come up with new and original dares, since Christen always seemed to enjoy the ones that were supposed to be “torturous.” Christen just liked a challenge. 

She’s just sitting in place, looking down, anxiously awaiting her turn, for a chance to let go for the night, drumming her fingernails on the back of her green phone case, when she hears _her_ name called out. 

“Truth or Dare, Tobin,” she heard Ali’s friend Becky call out. 

Her head shoots up at the mention of Tobin, not realizing the girl was even in the room. It’s not that she was avoiding her —…. okay, maybe she was avoiding her. At the same time, Christen had been so wrapped up in her thoughts about the girl and about herself lately that she’s become pretty much oblivious to everything around her. 

Hazel eyes locked on hers for a moment, and the weight of their stare was suffocating. She saw the smugness in her gaze, before Tobin looked away back to the blonde girl in her lap. And moments later, she’s dragging Jackie into the nearby closet. 

They hear the thuds and the whimpers even over the loud music coming from the next room over. And when the two of them emerged seven minutes later, there wasn’t a single uncertain thing about what had just happened in there.

It was what Christen had wanted from her the other day. 

“Damn, Jackie totally got some,” she heard the girl next to her whisper to her friend.

“They’re kinda cute together, right?” her friend replied. 

It’s in this moment that Christen realized just how much she wanted that.

And she wants to knock Jackie out for taking that away. But she can’t. Because the blonde girl is nice. Because Tobin looks so… happy right now. Because she ran from Tobin. Because then everyone would know.

_Do I care if they know?_

She knows it’s her drunk brain thinking. She also knows her face isn’t hiding anything at all. 

And Tobin’s doing her best not to look over, but Christen can tell that it’s taking her active effort not to do so. And that’s all the confirmation she needs in the moment. 

“Chrissy babe, truth or dare?” Ali calls out across the circle a few minutes later. 

“Dare,” she yells back, smiling mischeviously and leaning fully back into Brett’s legs. “Bring it Krieger.”

Christen knew that Ali was dying to finally psych her into picking drinking over a dare. She could practically see the wheels turning in her friend’s brain. 

“Do something right now that scares you.”

_That’s new._

“Ooh interesting one, Al” Becky throws over at her friend, alongside a fist bump from Ashlyn and a couple of compliments from other teammates around the circle. It left so much choice to Christen, unlike the usual dares she received.

Christen pauses for a moment as if she were thinking, only the sound of Don’t Let Me Down by Daya to be heard, pounding in the background. But she finds herself not thinking at all, her mind blank as she carefully watches Tobin’s hands tracing the skin between Jackie’s top’s end and where her jeans begin. 

_Fuck it._

Oh, the dangers of a drunk body and a thoughtless mind.

She stands up and starts walking toward Tobin, whose eyebrows furrow as she slowly paces over. Chatter is still erupting from around the room, and hazel eyes leave her own to look over her shoulder, as if there was maybe something else Christen was walking toward. And Christen is hesitant at first, slowing her walk, almost as if her body was trying to give her mind the time to back out of this impulsive decision.

Before her mind can come to join the party, Christen’s hands have reached out to pull Tobin’s face back toward her own, and then she’s moving her head forward until her own lips and pressed up against Tobin’s once again.

When she doesn’t feel Tobin move away, she leans her body forward, resting her knee on the side of Tobin’s lap that is not occupied by Jackie’s body, and moves her hands down to grip the back of her neck a little roughly. 

She’ll blame it on the alcohol, but the whole thing is a little rough, a little possessive. And just when she feels Tobin start to kiss back just a little, she’s pulling away, teeth dragging against Tobin’s bottom lip before she releases it. And then she’s slowly pushing herself back up to stand in front of Tobin. Eyes locked with Tobin’s the entire time as she grabs her favorite of Tobin’s snapbacks off of Jackie’s head, and licks her lips once as she places it backward on her own head.

It felt like she left the entire universe for the last 30 seconds, so when she came back to reality, realizing the room had gone silent, realizing her boyfriend was sitting five feet away, realizing what she had just done in front of everyone, she started to flip out.

_oh my god oh my god oh my god_

And what do you know, she runs, this time dragging Brett behind her, not looking back to the girl she left behind. 

Once she’s out of the room, pacing toward the front door, she tries to loosen her grip on Brett’s hand, but fails as she feels him tighten his own hand and pull her back around to his front, pressing her harshly against the wall. 

Suddenly, his face is right in front of hers. “That was so hot.” 

He leans in for a chaste kiss. “Let’s get out of here.”

Christen can’t breathe.

“Can I just meet you at home? I have to get some things from upstairs,” she lies convincably.

He leans in again. “Sure, babe. I’ll be waiting.”

Watching him walk out of the hallway, she sighs in relief at his lack of questioning and resistance. And Christen herself takes off toward the front of the house, to stand on the porch that had gotten her through nearly everything these past three years. It feels like her only constant right now — and yes, it is a piece of wood. If that doesn’t explain how Christen’s life is going right now, nothing does. 

She hadn’t realized just how long she had been standing out there leaning her front against the railing and watching drunk students fumble down the street in front of the house, until she felt a body leaning up right next to her, and she feels Tobin’s snapback peeled off of the top of her own head.

“I believe this is mine.”

Christen pauses, unsure where she wants to go with this, but sure that she has to respond. She’s frustrated. She’s angry. She’s upset with herself. She’s embarrassed, to be honest. 

“Did you ditch that blonde?” she snarkily replies. _Nice one, Christen. Real smooth._

“ _That blonde_ has a name. It’s Jackie. And no, she’s just grabbing her phone.”

At that comment, Christen lets her eyes wander over the girl next to her subtly, as she takes a sip of the beer in her hand. She sees the defined jawline, clenched as if she’s upset too. And that just makes her angrier. Even though she knows that she has no right to actually be mad. But she is. Because Tobin kissed back, and now she’s leaving with Jackie. And maybe even more than that, Christen is mad at herself. And drunk, angry Christen has no filter. 

“So what? You’re dating someone now?”

And now it’s Tobin’s turn to sit in silence, as if she’s deciding what to say. And that makes something churn in Christen’s stomach.

“What do you care?” she hears deflected back at her. 

“I just think you can do better.” _We fit like puzzles pieces_

“I think it’s none of your business who I date.”

“It is, were best friends Tobin.” _You know we’re more than that_

And then Tobin laughs cruelly, and it sends a shiver down her spine.

“Are we?”

Christen’s words get caught in her throat when she feels Tobin’s body turning toward her.

“You want to know what I think?” Tobin continues.

“Enlighten me,” Christen swallows thickly. _I’m sorry_

“I think I met a nice girl who doesn’t hit me with a metaphorical freight train every two seconds. And I think that scares you, that I found someone who actually makes me feel good. Someone that's not you.”

She nearly shrivels at the harsh truth behind those words. It’s the first time one of them has been this direct. And every inch of it is flooded in truth, and she can tell that Tobin is trying to gage her reaction.

To be honest, Christen is not doing a good job of hiding anything, if she was even trying to. So she’s feeling a little fired up, deciding to step up, full-flush against Tobin’s front.

“She couldn’t make you feel half as good as I could.” _I think I want you too_

And then they’re just standing there, staring into each other’s eyes, Tobin looking at her with such an intensity that it makes Christen instinctively want to pull back. But at the same time, she knows it’s a challenge. So she doesn’t move either. Christen likes a challenge.

And then she asks the one question that Christen just doesn’t want to hear. “Where’s your boyfriend?”

“Stop asking me about him.” _I don’t know what to do_

“Stop being with him,” Tobin says quickly.

The words pierce right through her.

“Tobin…” she breathes back at the girl, words left unsaid. _I’m confused_

Tobin gives her time to do something, to make any move or say anything letting her know that she wanted the girl too. But Christen feels stuck, and before she knows it, she’s alone on the porch, wanting to go anywhere but home to her boyfriend.

________________________________________________________

The next few weeks fly by. Christen finds herself throwing herself into her work to avoid this looming triangle that just sits over her head like a big freaking dark rain cloud, as she had been doing before. The difference is, she’s avoiding Brett too now, unable to face him, to lie to him, any longer. She just wants everything to be simple, to go back to how it was when she felt nothing but comfort in her half-hearted relationship with the football guy. Well… does she really? At least then, it didn’t hurt like it does now.

She had tried to finish her conversation with Tobin — several times, actually. But she just couldn’t get herself to actually do it. And after an emotional run-in at the 180 one night, when she realized just how much she had hurt Tobin, too, she took a step back.

She let go.

Because the only thing she couldn’t stand right now is to see that look of pain in those hazel eyes again, seeing the way she was slowly falling apart, watching Tobin try to hide tears, knowing they were likely her own fault — too much. 

She let go.

However, there was one line she didn’t let go off at all. 

_“You deserve to be happy”_ , Tobin had told her that night.

And so Christen has spent the last few weeks asking herself the same, one question every. single. day.

How in the hell did she get so unhappy?

Life went on in that time. She watched Tobin. She was always watching Tobin. However, Christen took three steps back for a while. It was only in the past week that she had noticed Tobin watching back again. 

And now she’s sitting in the back of a dark bus at 5 in the morning, headed to an NCAA tournament, watching the girl walk down the aisle, somehow making sweatpants, a t-shirt, and bedhead look mouth-wateringly sexy. At that moment, she realized the answer to her question certainly involves Tobin’s absence in some capacity. 

So she decides to text her. Because why the hell not.

And she smiles to herself when Tobin looks at her curiously with a small smile of her own. 

And Christen smiles even bigger when it only takes a little more prodding to get a conversation going with the girl. A conversation that persists intermittently throughout the day. For the bus ride there. For the walk into the hotel lobby. For the few hours before dinner. Only ending once they actually walk into Mexican restaurant with the team, both shutting their phones off and sitting at different tables across the restaurant. 

She’s happy, relieved even. It’s the first clear feeling she’s had in ages. But that is soon replaced with another feeling.

Christen had been only half engaged in conversation all night at the restaurant, sneaking glances toward Tobin, wondering if they’ll ever actually get to speak again in person. Wondering if she’ll be forgiven. Wondering how much of Tobin she can even get back at this point. 

The team table had filled up quickly, so Ashlyn, Kelley, and Tobin had been at their own table together. The rest of the team was too invested in conversation to notice a slight commotion happening at their table.

But not Christen, who was looking over curiously as Tobin is still staring endlessly across the restaurant, barely blinking, all muscles frozen. 

No one notices Christen staring at her, as she watched both Kelley and Ashlyn get up and jog quickly toward the direction that Tobin is looking, leaving the girl pale and alone at the table.

With the other two gone, Christen makes a split second decision to get up and walk over to her, sliding into the seat next to her.

“Tobs?” she asks.

No response.

“Tobin, you in there?” 

No response.

Instead of continuing to yell her name, Christen turns and picks up Tobin’s hands, starting to rub small circles on the insides of her wrists with her index fingers. 

It was something that Brett had always done to help her come back to reality when her anxiety made her zone out. 

After about a minute, she sees Tobin blink several times and shake her head, color returning to her face.

“Hey there,” she smiles in relief as Tobin comes back to reality.

“Hey,” she hears back.

Having had many similar panic moments herself, she empathetically intertwined their fingers for a few moments. Christen sees a tear escape from Tobin’s eye, and she hesitantly reaches her hand up to thumb it away with a small smile.

Again, she feels the tension in their stare and it scares her a little. But this time she stays put, just providing some familiarity and comfort to the girl, until she’s distracted by a tap on her right shoulder. 

Looking back, she sees the other two musketeers standing over her. 

Neither of them particularly like Christen at this moment in time. They just sort of stare at her until she releases Tobin’s hands, looking back at her once more before sheepishly standing up. 

She pauses when she sees another girl standing behind Kelley and Ashlyn — a beautiful brunette with crystal blue eyes. Christen doesn’t recognize her, but she doesn’t have time to ask questions, as the girl practically launches herself at Tobin, engulfing her in a large hug.

Tobin buries her head into the new girl’s neck.

A small scowl falls onto Christen’s face, and that same feeling from the kitchen of the Midweek Mayham party settles into her again.

The green-eyed girl doesn’t know it, but both Ashlyn and Kelley witnessed the reaction on her face, giving each other a look. 

She watches the brunette pull Tobin up by the hand, following Kelley and Ashlyn as they start to make their way off the patio and onto the beach, leaving Christen behind without a word, initially without a second look. She’s kinda bummed about it.

But then it happens. 

Green eyes meet hazel for a split second.

She looked back.

_She looked back._

And Christen felt it.

It coursed through her body like electricity. 

She had let her eyes linger on Tobin even after hazel eyes were no longer looking in her direction. When they were finally out of sight, she brought her mind back to the restaurant, realizing that she’d been so wrapped up in Tobin that she hadn’t even tried to figure out what it was that unrelentlessly knocked Tobin on her metaphorical ass just a few minutes before.

Still sitting at the empty table, Christen looks back over to the other side of the room, trying to determine what exactly the girl had been staring at.

All she sees are two girls sitting on top of each other, and then she gulps in recognition of one of them.

Christen hadn’t told Tobin, but a few days after Midweek Mayhem, she had snuck out of Brett’s apartment at 2 a.m. and gone all the way into her and Tobin’s dorm room to sit while Tobin slept. 

She knows that’s creepy.

She doesn’t need someone to tell her that. 

But it was really the only way to get close to her, without getting _too_ close. 

__ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ 

_She’d been sitting at Tobin’s desk for almost an hour, when she decided that it was time for her to get going._

_Carefully sliding the copy of Pride and Prejudice she had stolen from Tobin the month prior into her portable library shelf, she abruptly slowed her movement when she noticed a folded piece of paper resting under a blue paperweight in the corner of the desk._

_I shouldn’t._

_She did._

_Quietly and carefully, she unfolds the paper to see a photograph of a smiling, tan girl’s face._

_A shock of jealousy shoots through her veins, before she is able to shut herself down._

_Her brain feels like it is scattered in one hundred different pieces, but in reality there’s only two._

_Christen didn’t go back to Brett’s apartment that night. She **couldn’t**. It wasn’t fair._

_But she didn’t stay in Tobin’s dorm room either. She **couldn’t**. It wasn’t fair._

_“This isn’t for you. You have a boyfriend. You can be straight,” she finally whispered, before returning the picture and rushing out of the room, finding herself at the 180 rock — her safe place as of late — to sleep on top of for the night._

_Perhaps the fact that she went to the 180 **was** the answer to that question. But she wasn’t ready to deal with that yet._

__ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ 

Now, sitting in the restaurant one month later, staring at the real-life, tan-faced, girl from Tobin’s hidden photograph, and it’s like suddenly everything is hitting her all at once.

A tsunami of thoughts previously obliterated. Of feelings neglected. Of dreams unremembered.

A tsunami that stood fearlessly in front of the walls of fear that had encapsulated her mind.

And Christen sat there, powerless to her own mind, as the tsunami fiercely engulfed every inch of those walls, leaving the water, and everything within its bounds, to billow out all around her, inundating her entire mind.

 _Fuck. I like girls._

Christen stood up and walked calmly out of the front door of the restaurant.

There was no running away anymore. The tsunami had already torn everything down. 

And now, it was in Christen’s power to decide how she wanted to rebuild.

It’s also no surprise when she finds her feet have landed outside of Tobin’s hotel room. 

_Just say hi._

After knocking, she hears a loud commotion behind the door, before it swings open to reveal the beautiful, blue-eyed brunette from earlier that night.

She isn’t sure what to make of this moment, so she stares until she sees the face of her former best friend appear there as well with a big groan. 

Christen isn’t going to lie. She’s a little intimidated. But she puts on a brave face and finally speaks up. 

“Um, hi.”

Kelley audibly sighs at the sight of her, but Christen’s momentary reaction to that petty action is forgotten as she sees Tobin’s muscular form exit the bathroom in just a towel. She traces the girl with her eyes.

Before she knows it, Alex is shutting the door slightly, so that she is the only thing in the path of Christen’s vision. “Christen, right?”

_Wait, what?_

“Uh yeah… have we met?”

Her face relaxes as Alex laughs a little. 

“No. Sorry, I’m Alex, I —”

“played with Toby in California,” Christen finishes her sentence, relief washing over her face as she sees Alex’s face visibly soften.

“Yeah. I’ve heard about you too.”

_Wonderful._

“Oh,” Christen’s shoulders tense up toward her ears. “I’d say ‘only good things I hope,’ but …”

Alex just smiles back at her blankly, and Christen is just plain confused at this interaction. She sees Alex turn around pensively and then turn back to say “Now’s not really a good time.”

And she understands what Alex is actually saying — the subtext behind her words — so she quietly apologizes and turns to walk away from that awkward disaster.

“Tobs told me you’re a sucker for green tea. Unlike her, I have taste. Why don’t we go grab a cup downstairs, yeah?”

_This was a horrible idea._

“Sure.”

________________________________________________________

Christen and Alex got along remarkably well.

The conversation just kept flowing, mostly about soccer and their mutual home-state of California, as they walked down to the lobby to grab some tea. They continued to speak as they moved to sit outside on a bench at the top of the beach that spread out behind the hotel.

Eventually, though, they settled in a silence -- comfortable for Alex, not so much for Christen. 

Christen just kept sipping her tea. 

“I’ve heard so much about you from Tobs,” Alex repeats her line from earlier.

“You mentioned,” Christen hums back at her. 

“You’re pretty, kinda snarky too” Alex says.

Christen looks up at Alex, an unreadable expression on her face. “Uh, thanks… I think.” She runs over the words in her mind again for a moment. “Or maybe not?”

Alex just lets out a chuckle before taking another sip of tea. 

“Just an observation.”

“Okay.”

Quiet ensues again.

“I saw you at the restaurant,” Alex then throws into the air.

Christen just looks at her curiously, not sure where she’s going with this. 

“You’re not very subtle with the heart eyes.”

A blush rises up Christen’s cheeks. She’s quiet for a moment, letting out a long, deep breath, before she looks away from Alex and breathes out her reply. 

In normal circumstances, she would have likely refuted that statement. Or laughed it off. 

But, not tonight.

“I know.”

Alex looks surprised at her admission.

Christen knows what she _wants_ to say. But saying it reveals a lot more than even those two words she had confessed a moment earlier. 

Then again, the brunette next to her clearly knows more than she’s letting on, anyway. 

She takes a deep breath and speaks her mind.

“She has a girlfriend.”

To her surprise, Alex abruptly lets out a laugh. “No, she doesn’t.”

Christen recoils at her laugh, but looks on in confusion. “Yeah she does…”

“No, she doesn’t,” Alex repeats. “You have a boyfriend, though, don’t you? So what does it matter?”

Christen feels sick for a moment at Alex’s response, as she remembers the guy she hadn’t thought about all day. And for other reasons. 

“How’s the lucky guy doing?” Alex continues.

Christen’s silent for a moment, before responding firmly. “Can we talk about something else?”

Alex sends her a knowing glance, before standing up from the bench.

“Look, I don’t know you. But I know Tobin. She’s got one foot out the door. Maybe you should think about why you don’t want to answer that question, before she walks out on you.” 

Alex walks away back into the hotel after that, leaving Christen alone on the bench, with nothing but her thoughts and an empty beach, utterly startled at that turn in conversation. Then again, she was having tea with Tobin’s best friend who she didn’t know at all. She probably should have expected it. 

She closes her eyes to think for a moment. 

Why is it that she avoids answering questions about her two and a half year relationship?

 _Because I’ve never dated a girl._

_Because what is my life without Brett at this point?_

_Because my Mom is dying._

_Because my Mom loves Brett._

_Because I’m scared._

But now, she knows the only reason that matters.

“He’s not Tobin,” she whispers to herself.

________________________________________________________

The game the next day was just a cyclical whirlwind of emotions.

First half was quite possibly the worst start of her college career. Passes seemed to always be a foot or two off target, shots hitting the post, the other team always guessing which way she was lunging in 1v1s. It was bad, and Coach Doug’s halftime disappointment talk made that _very_ clear. 

Christen had decided to redo her two dutch braids before the second half — a fresh start. She’s skipping out of the bathroom area of their away locker room, when she sees Tobin laying across one of the benches, and it startles a high-pitched noise out of her. 

“Oh. Hey Tobin,” she says once she retained her sanity post-scare, hanging her face over Tobin’s upper half to see if she’s okay.

“Hey,” the girl returns.

Christen backs up as she watches Tobin push herself to a sitting position, straddling the locker room bench.

“You good?”

She’s hoping that Tobin will answer this in a way that let’s her actually know how she is after last night, even though she knows that she has no right to know.

“We’re sucking out there right now.”

_Of course._

“Yeah, we are,” she shortly replies, just biting her lip, deciding whether or not to touch that line again. She decides to this time.

“I didn’t get to talk to you again after last night,” she says hesitantly and slowly, continuing nervously once she realizes Tobin is not answering her. “I was kinda worried about you.”

“You were worried about me?”

It was an honest response, but said in their typical teasing manner. Yet, Christen could see the hidden question that Tobin was really asking. 

Don’t let it go to your head, Heath,” she jokes back.

Before the moment can progress, she stands up to head out of the locker room, pausing for a moment before turning around and extending her hand, hoping that Tobin will take her peace offering.

Her breath quickens noticeably when she feels Tobin’s warm hand envelop her own, and she pulls the girl to a standing position. 

She tightens her grip when she feels Tobin trying to let go, not wanting to release the sense of familiar comfort shooting up her left arm, before pulling the girl to the door.

It’s only when they are actively passing through that door that their eyes meet, and Christen’s hopeful brain leaves the galaxy for a moment, replaced with pure want. They hadn’t been this close to each other, while alone together, since _that_ night.

So she stops moving suddenly, feeling Tobin’s body crash into her back.

_God_

And then, as if once again her mind is disconnected from the rest of her corporeal existence, she feels her feet moving forward, backing Tobin into the wall as she stares into her hazel eyes, pinning her arms next to her body, just staring into the girl, taking her in.

She didn’t mean to do it.

But she finds herself pressing against her, leaning in, almost as if she’s magnetized by the Tobin. 

Her eyes leave hazel ones, drifting down to her lips, following Tobin’s tongue as it traces them.

And then she speaks her thoughts out loud.

“You go straight to my head, Heath.”

Tobin is gulping.

And she’s leaning in too.

And Christen forgets they’re outside the locker room at half time

And she forgets they’re in Florida.

She forgets everything.

Until she hears his voice.

“Chris?”

_crap_

Christen feels herself instinctively pull back, but not before seeing the look in Tobin’s eyes. The same one she had that night they had first kissed. The one that said _don’t do this_.

But Brett’s her boyfriend. And she has no reason to be mauling Tobin in the tunnel at half time, no excuse. And he can’t know. People can’t know about this, right?

So she releases Tobin’s wrists and looks down at her feet, not being able to bear the weight of Tobin’s hurting gaze any longer. But she doesn’t expect the sound of Tobin’s footsteps walking away to hurt just as much. 

She almost forgets about him until he speaks again.

“Chris?”

“What are you doing here, Brett?” she replies sharply, taking a few steps away from where he is approaching.

“It’s your big tournament. What did I just walk into?”

“Yeah, but I told you not to come,” she exasperates, ignoring the second part of his statement.

He pauses in confusion. “I don’t understand why you suddenly told me not to come.”

“I really can’t do this right now,” she starts walking past him, but he reaches out and grabs her arm.

“Is it because of her? Just tell me what the hell has been going on lately, Chris?”

“Not right now!” she replied with more force.

“It is because of her, isn’t it.”

“She’s just a friend.”

“Yeah and so was Kelley, and the other girl from this summer, and the black-haired girl from the bar.”

She gulps. “You would be correct. Wow, a true genius.”

The look she’s receiving tells her he knows better.

“What’s your point, B?” she continues.

“A year ago you would have been happy to see me here. Right now, it seems like you don’t even want to talk to me.”

“Brett, I’m standing in a tunnel arguing with you, rather than getting ready for the second half of a very stressful, tied game. So no, I don’t want to be talking to you right now.” 

It comes out a little aggressive, and she’s quick to backtrack. “I just — can we talk later?”

He takes a step back in defeat, and she jumps on the momentary lapse in conversation to walk away. 

When she enters the game just five-or-so minutes later, it’s with a renewed vengeance. A desire to be nowhere but the game, mentally and physically. She’s tired and overwhelmed, and honestly angry at the way things seem to be working out. 

Some would call it skill, but she credits her inner fury for the ball from Tobin that she slams into the upper 90. Or perhaps it was the realization that she had made a big freaking mistake, once again. 

The hazel-eyed girl was practically fuming out there after seeing Brett in the tunnel, yet she somehow continuously got the ball to Christen without ever actually looking in her direction.

So when the ball hit the net, and cheers erupted from the sideline and teammates were running toward her, she found herself sprinting from them full-speed at Tobin instead, crashing into her and holding on tight, as if she was begging the girl not to let her go — in more than one way.

“I didn’t know he was here,” Christen whispers, hoping Tobin can hear her over the sound of her perceptibly quickening heartbeat. 

And she did hear her. But Christen shrivels into herself when she feels the girl’s entire body tense and her mouth emit the words, “Sure you didn’t.”

The words echo throughout her mind after Tobin releases her. And they’re still racing through their mind when the team is shaking hands with Stanford after clenching their 1-0 win.

Christen is also shaking hands, but she’s much more focused on the happiness radiating off of Tobin at that moment, so far from what she herself is feeling. 

It brings a smile to her face to see the girl that way again. So when she sees a certain tan girl from a familiar photograph slowly approaching Tobin, she can’t help but run up and step in front of her. “Don’t,” she says to the girl who clearly has no clue who she is.

But Shirley clearly knows what Christen was doing here. She sees Shirley swallow deeply and take a last look at Tobin, who is facing the other way, now walking toward the sideline. Sighing, Shirley nods and turns to walk back toward the bench. 

And then Christen is turning around to look toward the sideline. She sees Brett, of course, but her eyes have instead settled on Tobin hugging a familiar blonde girl.

She watches them talk, before she sees Jackie point over in her direction. 

_Is she pointing at me? Wait, why do I care?_

She lets out a sigh, which turns into a hiccup when she’s startled by a pretty, blue-eyed brunette whom she didn’t even see approaching her, but whose face clearly gave away that she had been watching Christen for the past few minutes.

“Nice goal. Tobs certainly thought so,” Alex said knowingly, shaking Christen’s hand before making one last comment and walking away. “Nice save, too”

And Christen knew that she was talking about Shirley. How awkward.

She’s left standing there for a minute, watching Tobin throw an arm around Jackie, wishing it was herself, before forcing herself to walk over to her smiling boyfriend farther down the sideline.

_Fuck me._

________________________________________________________

Brett drove her back to the hotel.

And it was a whole lot of quiet, the only sounds in his black jeep being that of the classic rock radio station and the nervous thumping of Christen’s leg against the passenger side floor.

It’s not until they are through her hotel room door and they recognize Morgan isn’t back yet, that Brett actually speaks. 

“Congrats on the game.”

She turns to him and puts on a smile. It’s not entirely fake. This guy has been with her through literally everything, knows how much this season meant to her, knows how much that goal meant to her. 

“Thanks, B. I can’t believe that went in. I’m so happy.”

But that sense of comfort, that sense of passion that she used to feel everytime he looked at her — it’s just plain gone. And after talking to Alex, Christen thinks that she’s finally realized that she doesn’t want it back. At least, not with him.

“Were you? That’s great. Couldn’t see your face from where it was buried in Tobin’s neck,” he responds in a snarky manner.

Christen may be ready to admit it to herself. But she’s most definitely not ready to talk about it with others.

“What’s your problem? She’s my best friend.”

“You haven’t spoken to her in weeks.”

“People have disagreements, Brett.”

“Yeah and after all of your ‘disagreements’, your ‘best friend’ seemingly vanishes into thin air.”

“What are you even talking about?”

“Kelley, and now Tobin. Were you even going to tell me you were fucking her too?”

“God, Brett, we’re _not_ —”

He cuts her off as he starts pacing on the far side of the room.

“I’ve been trying to figure out all this time why you’ve been pulling away. I thought it was because of my mistake, but I realized it’s been going on longer than that,” he starts. Then his eyes open wide as if he has just pieced it all together. “It started with Kelley.”

“I don’t know what you’re trying to insinuate here. I’ve just been really busy lately, I don’t know what to tell you.”

“Being busy is fine. You know I’ve always supported you and how much time you put into what you care about. That’s not the issue, Chris. Every single free moment, you spent it with _them_.”

“I’m allowed to have close friends that aren’t you, Brett!”

“Close friends? Do you think I’m _blind_ , Christen? You were practically fucking her in that tunnel earlier.”

“We’re NOT fucking! I’m not like that!” she practically screams, before lowering her head into her hands and sitting down on the bed.

She hears Brett mutter something indecipherable to himself before the mattress next to her sinks down and a large hand makes contact with her back for a brief moment, before she feels two hands drag her own from where they cover the tears now running down her cheeks.

“I love you,” she quietly says to him.

It tastes wrong as it rolls off her tongue. 

“I know.”

The eye contact that ensues is not charged. It’s sad, it’s fearful. It feels like … the beginning of an end. And it lasts another minute, before Christen finally speaks up.

“I’m confused.”

“Sounds like it,” he breathes out, pausing before his entire face shifts. “Let’s just forget about it for the night, yeah? Maybe some time away from _them_ will help get you out of their spell and back to normal.”

She doesn’t even have the energy to convey how _off_ that statement made her feel. Instead, she opts to go swimming by herself at the pool on the roof of the hotel. 

Avoidance at its finest. 

They had a few hours before the team planned to head out to a local bar together to celebrate. Christen spent it alternating between laying on a pool chair and floating in the water, just trying to get her mind off of everything.

 _Maybe he’s right. I just need to get away from her and everything will be fine,_ she thinks to herself as she’s walking to her chair to grab her things and head back inside. But all she sees is empty white plastic.

She could have sworn this is where she was sitting, and sure enough there were her shoes under that chair, confirming her thoughts. Looking around in a panic, she realizes that her bag, complete with her towel, phone, and room key are no longer there.

_are you SERIOUS_

And that’s how she finds herself wet and practically naked in the hotel elevator, cursing herself for getting herself into this situation. Once again, it just feels like plain karma. 

Just to make matters worse, the elevator stops on the eleventh floor, doors opening to reveal a dressed up Tobin Heath, who throws her head back laughing when she sees Christen in the elevator, before shoving her hands in her pockets and slowly pacing into the elevator as well.

_could today get any worse?_

Self-consciously, Christen crosses her arms over her abdomen (as if that actually covered anything).

_why isn’t she speaking_

“What are you doing in here?”

She sees Tobin shift against the back wall through the reflection in the elevator door. “Don’t come any closer.” She raises a hair clip defensively. She can’t handle being any closer to the girl when she’s all dressed up like this and… well … oozing sex appeal. 

_this is unfair_

“I don’t think that’s going to injure anyone,” she sees the brunette respond with a grin.

“Depends where I put it. You won’t see it coming.”

_what does that even mean Christen??_

Tobin seems to roll with it, and she watches the girl obviously check out her mostly-naked body. “Don’t think you have too many places to hide it there, Chris.”

If she’s being honest, Christen doesn’t really remember the rest of the conversation. She can’t remember anything beyond the way Tobin’s toned body feels against her bare back, the feeling of Tobin’s fingers slipping below her bathing suit bottom and tracing lines on her skin, teasing her. The whimpers that escape her lips unwillingly at each touch. 

It unleashed a fire deep within, edged her cravings without giving her the reward, made her feel ethereal for a brief moment.

Tobin-induced amnesia, if she were to label it.

But she does remember how it ended. 

“Tell your boyfriend I say hi.”

And Christen’s having trouble standing on two feet when the elevator door closes and she’s once again going up, having missed her floor in sheer astonishment of the bold challenge of the hazel-eyed girl. Christen felt like the air around her was once again raging with electricity.

_God._

________________________________________________________

By the time she’s walking into the club with Brett, Christen feels like she’s going to explode into a thousand pieces. She was so in her head trying to convince herself she would be okay with seeing Tobin again that night, that Brett quite literally had to shake her into reality as the bouncer asked for their ID’s.

Making their way over to the table, her stomach twists six times over when she sees Jackie there too, draped halfway over Tobin’s lap. She instinctively reaches for Brett’s hand, ignoring his confused smile, just needing to feel grounded in a way she hadn’t felt at all since she ran out of Tobin’s room weeks before.

“Chris!”

She turns her head when she hears her name called ten feet from the table.

“Ali, thank god,” she breathes out.

“Look more excited to be here, why don’t you?” she jokes, before looking over Christen’s shoulder. “Hey Brett, what’s up.”

“Hey Al,” he responds. “You here with Ash tonight?”

“Yup! Just supporting bae, you know how it is.”

Brett lets out a sarcastic laugh. “Yeah.”

Ali seems to pick up on the weird tension between them, opting to grab her friend’s hand and lead them both straight to the table, where Christen is met with several enthusiastic greetings.

Yet, her attention is drawn entirely by the one person who didn’t say hi. It’s drawn by the smugness covering Tobin’s entire face. As if she just _knows_.

Hazel eyes are holding her own stare, taunting her.

And it’s Christen who breaks, when her eyes duck to follow Tobin’s tongue lap a red cherry. A sharp, tangy feeling shoots straight to her core at the sight.

_seriously_

For the next minute, she completely zones out of the world around her, watching as Jackie giggles in her seat and Tobin goes to move her lips against Jackie’s. 

Christen feels sick, looking down at her hands. 

Her attention is brought back up when she hears a series of “What’s up Jackie?” and “Why the face?” Everyone is looking straight at Jackie, except for the one girl Christen cares about. She sees the hazel-eyed girl just lean back, smirk on her face, and Christen meets Tobin’s eyes, seeing in her peripherals Jackie pulling a perfectly tied cherry stem out of her mouth and placing it on the table.

A split second — Christen looks down at it and then back up at Tobin.

And then Tobin’s tongue comes out to trace her lips.

And then Tobin winks.

And Christen’s mouth goes dry.

“Let’s get drinks,” she turns to Brett, dragging him away before he can respond, intentionally not looking back at the table behind her. She’s losing this game, for sure. 

Again, avoidance is the answer she chooses.

For the next two hours, she doesn’t leave the bar. Christen figures it’s easier that way — still having fun, but far enough away that she can steal glances harmlessly from a distance. That is, until Tobin and Jackie suddenly appear across the bar, less than ten feet away.

“—and coach was like play it cool, but I knew we could get that first-down if I took the risk,” Brett is finishing a story.

Christen just launches her arms around her neck, hugging him closely.

“Uh, thanks babe,” he says in confusion.

“Yeah, so awesome!” Honestly she wasn’t listening, eyes trained on a certain someone else. 

“Well, hoping maybe I can score tonight too,” he comments suggestively.

Christen’s distracted, watching Tobin pull Jackie toward the dance floor, before looking back at her boyfriend.

“Oh yeah?” she baits him.

A minute later, she’s pulling him through the crowds on a dark dance floor, only stopping when she can make out a slim figure that she’d know anywhere.

And then they’re moving. 

Arms resting on his shoulders, his hands find their way to her hips, starting to make them sway back and forth to the beat of the music. 

His forehead comes to meet her own, before soft lips meet her cheek and she hears a whispered “you’re so sexy,” that should make her quiver.

But it doesn’t.

Because he is not the person on her mind right now.

So she takes his arms off of her and spins herself around to press her back flush against his front, starting to press back into his pelvis as she moves back and forth. She felt Brett’s hands roaming her body.

The music is so loud her eardrums are practically bursting.

But the moment hazel eyes meet her own, Christen swears the room went silent. 

Then she’s watching Jackie’s hands on Tobin’s torso. And that’s all she wants. All she needs.

Too far under Tobin’s spell to escape it.

She pulls her bottom lip between her teeth, still looking into those hazel eyes, and the way they light up everytime the red light flashes through the club’s dance floor.

And her body is aching, and Tobin is looking at her like she wants to eat her for dinner.

And Christen doesn’t think anyone has _ever_ looked at her like that before.

“I’m going to run to the bathroom real quick,” she whisper-shouts into Brett’s ear, waiting until he nods and releases her before turning quickly on her heel and practically sprinting to the bathroom.

Someplace she could breathe for a moment.

But that moment didn’t last long.

Hanging over the sink, she hears the door swing open, and she doesn’t even need to look up to know it’s _her_.

Letting out a huff, she straightens up and looks over at Tobin.

_fuck it_

“Tobin,” she starts, startled as Tobin starts to take steps toward her, and she starts backing up herself. “We need to talk. I—”

Before another word is said, she finds herself pushed up against the wall, the rest of her sentence swallowed by Tobin’s searching lips. 

Christen feels her entire body light up.

“I don’t fucking want to talk anymore.”


	7. champagne all night

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> scandalous and scandals, action and avoidance

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> get’s a little TV-14 lol. Thanks for reading guys:) Hope you enjoy!
> 
> \--> This was a *2* chapter update (both 6 and 7) <\--
> 
> Ch6 is Christen's POV, as was requested! So go back and read the one before this if you wanted to see that. Again, sorry for the wait, college got busy as hell :)

“I don’t want to fucking talk anymore.”

A pause. 

A pause so long that someone could have flown to London, visited Big Ben, and travelled out to a small B&B run by a sweet elderly woman in the English countryside to sip tea and go on hour-long walks through the farmlands, and travel back before either of the two girls moved. 

Tobin’s hand drops from Christen’s cheek to the curve of her neck. She can see a slight red tint making its way onto Christen’s cheek, as the girl moves her head to look at the ground. They’re close enough that Tobin’s white t-shirt is touching the front of Christen’s oversized shirt.

But she steps closer, eliminating the space between them entirely, and Tobin feels under her fingertips on her neck, Christen’s heartbeat starting to pulse rapidly. So she softly asks the same question she had asked earlier that night in the elevator. 

“What do _you_ want, Chris?”

“I —”

Tobin moves her fingers down Christen’s neck and traces her collarbone, which is visible above the top of her shirt.

“I want —”

Her other hand finds the skin on Christen’s thigh underneath where her long t-shirt ends, scraping her short finger nails up the girl's leg lightly, and Christen lets out a hasty breath, interrupting her own response again.

“I want —”

Tobin easily smirks at the visible effect she’s having on the girl, before removing her fingers from the girl's collarbone and using them under her chin to tilt Christen’s head back up toward her, before placing it firmly on the wall beside her head. When she makes contact with the girl’s eyes again, the green of her irises has nearly vanished, her pupils completely blown into a dark black color. It makes her swallow deeply. Christen’s tongue comes out to wet her lips, and Tobin compulsively traces her tongue with her eyes.

“What do you want, Chris?” she breathes out again onto the girl’s lips, just a few inches from her own. 

Christen’s whimpered response pangs someplace deep in her core. 

Tobin leans slightly forward, close enough that their lips are nearly touching, ghosting each other. She feels Christen start to lean forward to, lips just barely coming into contact before Tobin quickly averts her mouth to drag her teeth across the girl’s jaw, tongue soothing along the way, all the way up to her ear, where she whisper’s one last time, because she needs to hear the girl answer the question. 

“Tell me what you want.”

And then Tobin is surprised as the girl yanks her head back by the hair and pulls Tobin’s face back in front of her own, eyes moving up from Christen’s lips to meet her penetrating stare.

“I want you.”

The blunt words cause a blazing fire to settle straight between Tobin’s legs, and she surges forward to connect their lips once again. The kiss itself is far more passionate and cautious than their previous kisses, but it burns her up inside just the same.

Tobin drags her fingertips farther up Christen’s thigh, lifting her leg to wrap around her own waist, hands travelling under the long shirt to the crease of her hip, where she feels only a singular strap. It’s then that she processes that the girl is not wearing any pants.

The thought makes a low moan emerge from the back of Tobin’s throat, and she feels Christen apply more pressure on her lips, hands tangled in her hair.

Tobin’s hand keeps travelling along Christen’s bare legs before decidedly moving higher to feel the soft skin of her stomach, fingertips finally tracing down to hook just in the top of the girl’s lacy thong.

Christen gasps at the sudden action, and Tobin doesn’t hesitate to take the chance to slip her tongue inside Christen’s mouth, working her tongue fiercely as her fingers drag horizontally along the waistline of her thong.

Just as she thinks she’s done the girl in, Christen’s using her leg around Tobins waist to propel them around, slamming Tobin against the wall she had just been pressed up against. It’s everything she likes about the girl — the unexpected force that is Christen Press. And truthfully in all the girls she’s hooked up with, she’s never had a girl try to challenge her like this before. The growing pool of wetness between her legs is proof enough that she likes it. 

Christen is slotting her leg between Tobin’s, eliciting another groan from the hazel-eyed girl, who moves both her hands up higher under Christen’s shirt in response, before detaching her lips to kiss along Christen’s neck. She’s whispering “you’re so fucking beautiful” as she bites repeatedly at the soft skin underneath her mouth, soothing it after with her tongue, before slowing down entirely, kissing up her jaw, to the corner of her mouth, and then giving her one longer, kiss.

“You’re so beautiful,” Tobin repeats in a low voice onto Christen’s lips as they stare into each other for a weighted moment.

And Christen leans forward for a much more delicate, tender kiss that lasts only a few seconds, but fills Tobin in a way she’s never, ever felt before.

“Need you now”, Christen says into Tobin’s open mouth, before pressing her lips onto Tobin’s with a kind of bold desperation that has Tobin gripping harder at the girl’s skin to keep herself from buckling to the floor in the heat of it all. 

She’s pushing Christen back from where the girl has her pinned against the wall. Pushing her across the entire room until the girl’s back is pressed up against the bathroom door, lips locked the entire time. They continue to explore each other’s mouths desperately for another minute before Tobin gives her one lingering, chaste kiss, teeth dragging across Christen’s lip as she pulls back, and then her entire body takes a step back. 

A heated stare erupts between them once again, leaving Tobin feeling utterly dizzy as she looks at Christen, lips swollen and pink, eyes filled with something that could only equate to desire.

And Christen stares back at her just as intensely.

And the music is so loud Tobin can barely hear the sound of her own racing heart in her ears.

And with that step between them, Christen by the door, she was giving Christen a choice again. Because this time, Christen had to choose her. She needed one more confirmation that she wasn’t fucking up all over again.

Christen is biting her bottom lip over her smirk and looking into Tobin’s eyes as she reaches behind herself and flips the lock to the bathroom door.

The next four moments, as she walks up toward Tobin with a small smile on her face, feel like a literal eternity. She stops in front of Tobin, moving her hands up over Tobin’s chest, linking them around her shoulders, whispering, “I think you need me now, too.”

And with that, Tobin surges toward her, not even bothering to protest, arms encircling her waist and tightening rapidly, lips meeting in an urgent fury.

Christen tilts her head, reorienting their positions as she works her tongue against Tobin’s, who tangles her finger in the girl’s curly black hair. 

It feels like a barely strained muscle — that pain that kind of feels good, that you want to feel again, as the green-eyed girl pushes her against the sink counter and rolls her body up against Tobin’s, who lets out something closed to a high-pitched whine.

Then she’s reaching down to the bottom of Tobin’s white t-shirt and detaching her own lips from the girl to pull the shirt over her head quickly, tossing it on the counter adjacent to their connected bodies. Pulling back to see what she revealed, Christen bites her lip before bending down and licking her way up Tobins abs, while looking into her eyes.

“Oh my god” Tobin breathes out under her breath, head looking up to the ceiling for a moment to collect herself before licking her lips and looking back down at Christen. 

And Christen is looking up at her all smug before kissing up her neck and returning to her lips, having to break the kiss for a moment when she’s smiling too big. 

Tobin pulls back to see her laughing lightly, and Christen just brings her thumb up to trace Tobin’s against the bottom lip.

“What?” Tobin chuckles quietly.

“Didn’t think you’d be this easy.”

And Tobin’s just not having it, tangling her fingers in the girl’s hair again and tugging lightly before flipping them so Christen’s lower back is up against the sink counter. The girl now beneath her lets out a whimper at the action that Tobin feels shoot through her.

“Didn’t think you’d be this desperate,” she whispers back, smirk engulfing the bottom of her face

Christen’s jaw slacks open a little as she smiles and rolls her eyes. It’s this banter that lit a fire in both of them, that continuously drew them both in. It was the challenge they both craved, the fight they never backed down from.

And Tobin takes the time in Christen’s silence to run her hands down and under Christen’s shirt, starting to pull it up, only pulling it over her head when she sees Christen nod, giving her consent. 

The sight before her makes her mouth go completely dry, and the space between her legs go completely wet. Tobin nearly moans as Christen is wearing a matching, thin black lace lingerie set, smiling knowingly. 

Tobin just starts to kiss down her neck again as she lifts Christen up onto the counter. She continues kissing down her neck, chest, stomach, and ghosting her lips over Christen’s right hip and biting down, soothing with her tongue.

Spreading the girls legs apart as she gets on her knees, Tobin looks up biting her lip, with question in her eyes, lazily threading her pointer fingers under the sides of the black lace on her hips.

Christen nods impatiently again, leaning back to put her weight on her hands behind her and bucking her hips up. 

Tobin kisses down her legs as she drags the piece of lace down them slowly, Christen whining in anxious anticipation, before crawling back up, running her tongue up the inside of her left thigh, ghosting over where the girl _really_ wants her. She’s lightly biting the fabric over Christen’s already hard nipples, and then kissing back up her jaw to her lips.

Her hands trace their way up Christen’s inner thighs.

“Please,” Christen says breathily straight into her mouth.

“Need something, Chris?”

“Tobin I swear to god.”

“Yes?”

“You’re such a tease.”

Tobin takes that moment to run a finger through Christen’s folds slowly. “I think you like it,” she says back in a low voice.

Christen’s breath catches in her throat as she lets out a strangled groan.

“You suck,” she breathes out broken and panting.

“That’s not very nice” Tobin teases in return, dragging her fingers up and down Christen’s inner thigh.

“Tobin, just touch me.”

Tobin brings her other hand to lightly wrap around the side of Christen’s throat, begging the girl to look deep into her eyes. “Or what?”

Christen drags her tongue along her bottom lip and nods, lowering her own fingers to circle her clit a few times, moaning filthily, and closing her eyes, before opening them and settling back on Tobin. “Just fuck me or I’ll do it myself.”

Knocked off guard, Tobin immediately leans in again, sucking on Christen’s bottom lip and unable to believe that she finally has this girl writhing beneath her. She’s had tons of girls in this position before, but she thinks none of them have even come close to how sexy the green-eyed girl is. Not even in the same ballpark. And Tobin wants to keep teasing her, make her wiggle and whine, build her up slowly, but it’s as if the past four months have served as foreplay in themselves.

She releases Christen’s throat and drags her hand down the girl’s body, rolling the girl’s nipples through the lacy fabric, as she drags her tongue through Christen’s center once, removing it after to look up at Christen’s dark, wanting eyes. 

Hips buck up at the loss of contact, and Tobin smiles, kissing her clit chastly once before deciding to just give in. She just wanted to make this girl feel good right now.

She sees Christen’s eyes roll into the back of her head as her tongue begins to make slow, big circles. “Oh my god yes.”

And Christen keeps speaking, and moaning, and directing Tobin, and telling her exactly what she wants. Honestly, Tobin’s not surprised at how vocal Christen is. The girl’s confident energy seems to permeate and radiate through every plane of her existence.

She firmly loops her arms around Christen’s hips to keep them in place, feeling her breathing rate steadily increase. 

This has been a _long_ time coming.

And soon she feels Christen’s hands grip the back of her head roughly as she’s all breathy whimpers and moans.

Tobin speeds her tongue up, closing the radius of her circles.

Their eyes lock one more time, and then there’s a loud, strangled moan, and she feels it — feels her stomach muscles clench beneath her hands, feels the thud as Christen’s head slams back against the glass mirror, feels her breath hitch and her hips shoot upward, feels a gush of warm liquid on her tongue.

After helping her ride it out, she pulls back and makes eye contact again with Christen’s dazed but still ever-so-fiery eyes. Christen just yanks her up with a tug on her sports bra before attaching their lips together with renewed and passionate ferocity, panting into Tobin’s mouth and moaning as she surely tastes herself. 

A moment later, she’s wrapping her legs securely around Tobin’s waist, pulling her closer with arms around her shoulders, and Tobin is running her hands up Christen’s thighs and around her waist, also pulling the girl closer to the edge of the counter, kissing her once more.

“You’re unreal,” she hears Christen say.

And Tobin just smirks in response.

The moment quickly becomes heavy again, as they’re looking into each other's eyes and holding onto each other. Christen’s hand comes up to run across Tobin’s cheekbone and it feels almost intimate. 

But they’re interrupted by a loud bang on the door and the sound of people yelling over the music.

And then they’re both just laughing.

Tobin reaches down and holds her black lace underwear out on a finger. 

“I was just getting started,” Tobin pouts.

Christen rolls her eyes, hopping off the counter and throwing on her long shirt, before grabbing her underwear, stepping flush to Tobin’s front just like she had a few minutes before, and reaching around quickly to shove the black lace in the girl’s back pocket.

“You ruined them anyway,” she says with a wink, before grabbing Tobin’s hand and pulling her toward the door, letting go to actually unlock and open the door. She’s apologizing to the eagerly waiting strangers as she steps through the doorway.

Christen stops walking when she doesn't see Tobin next to her, turning around to see the girl just standing there, leaning back against the wall next to the bathroom door. When Christen finally meets her eyes, she turns her head for a prolonged moment to her right, to the back exit down the hall, then silently turns back and stares at Christen.

Green eyes hesitate, taking a moment to look over her shoulder to the bar, where Tobin can see Brett talking to Ali and Ashlyn. 

And then Christen is turning and confidently walking down the hallway.

A smug smirk rise to Tobin’s lips, as she pushed herself up and followed the green-eyed girl down the hallway. 

Christen’s hand had found its way into Tobin’s on the walk back to the hotel, and Christen was practically yanking through the first floor lobby. As soon as the elevator doors were shut, she was all over Tobin, kissing her neck, telling her how hot she was, saying she was sorry. 

They jump apart as the doors open 3 floors before theirs and an old woman walks in. They don’t move, just staring at each other from opposite sides of the elevator. The woman got off the next floor, but neither Tobin nor Christen moved then. 

It was like their eyes were having a whole conversation about how bad they both wanted this. Only stopping to run one after another down the hallway of the 11th floor to the outside of Room 1102. They have to go to Tobin’s room, as Brett was supposed to stay with Christen that night. She didn’t tell him she was leaving. In this moment, she didn’t care.

It all feels like a drunken dream — Christen coming up behind her, arms wrapping around her waist, kissing her neck as Tobin fumbles with the key card, distracted by Christen’s touch blazing everywhere through her.

As soon as they’re through the door, Tobin’s twisting around and pushing Christen up against it.

And then time passed by in slow motion. 

Laying together, legs intertwined, multiple hours later, multiple orgasms later, Christen runs her finger up and down Tobin's bare abdomen, feeling her abs contracting with each touch. 

They lay there in silence for quite some time, enjoying this moment away from reality. This moment that is so scary, but so comforting. So safe, but so uncertain.

And Tobin just has to know.

“What about —”

Christen shushes Tobin at lightning speed. “Not tonight.”

“Chris,” she whispers in a pained voice, as her body tenses up.

“Tomorrow. I promise,” Christen says, before burying her head under Tobin’s cheek and kissing her exposed chest, letting her eyes flutter shut.

_______________________________________________________________

She wakes up the next morning to the sound of feet dragging across the hotel room floor. Tobin groans and brings her hands up to her head as she registers the pounding of her hangover, before opening her eyes slowly.

There, tiptoeing across the room is a barefoot Kelley O’Hara, holding in her arms a pile of clothes, as well as her shoes from the night before, looking like a deer in the headlights.

“Hey, sorry,” Kelley grimaces, “I was trying to be quiet.”

“Oh my god can you take it down like six notches my head is going to fall off.”

Kelley chuckles as she closes the shades on the window to remove the bright light from the hungover atmosphere of Room 1102. “Me too dude, me too.”

“Wait where are you coming from?”

“Nowhere.”

“Kel…” she trails off.

“The bathroom?”

Tobin gasps in recognition.

“You were in Alex’s room, weren’t you?” she practically screams, before groaning at her own volume. “I knew I was sensing some vibes.”

“There were no vibes Tobin.”

“Were too.”

“Were not.”

“Were too.”

“Were NOT!”

“Whatever, I’m totally on board whenever you decide to let me on the Alex train.”

“I admit nothing.”

Tobin just raises up to her elbows and raises an eyebrow skeptically, prompting Kelley to roll her eyes. 

“Tobs, can I have one of those Advils on the nightstand.”

“What Advil…” she trails off as she sees a glass of water and three pills sitting on top of a folded piece of paper on the nightstand. Her eyes go wide as last night’s events come flooding back into her mind, and she registers that she’s alone in bed. She quickly tucks the note under the side of her torso.

Kelley’s just walking over with her palm face-up, and Tobin dumps one pill in her friend’s hand before gulping down the other two and chugging the entire glass of water. 

“At least this girl was nice enough to leave you Advil and water,” Kelley laughs out. 

Tobin panics for a moment. For multiple reasons. “What girl? There’s no girl. I’m alone.”

“Just you and the twin sisters,” Kelley smirks, pointing at Tobin’s exposed upper half. “Would you put on a shirt dear god.”

Tobin pulls the sheet over her upper half before catching the t-shirt that Kelley throws her, mumbling “thanks’ in response.

“Why do you look so grumpy? Was she not good or something?”

And it’s at that moment that Tobin realized that Kelley had no idea who was here the night before. And Tobin’s a little confused on everything, on where they stand, so she opts to keep it that way.

“Uh, no she was fine,” she says distractedly.

“Fine?” Kelley just laughs as she launches herself onto the bed, shoulder-to-shoulder to her friend. “Well that explains it.”

Tobin’s suddenly feeling defensive of the night before. “No, what? Sorry, she was better than fine dude,” she says in a bright tone that contradicted her alcohol-induced painful state, thinking back to the way Christen’s fingers caressed her body. “The things this girl did, like oh my god, she did this one thing where she put —”

“Woah woah! I have already seen and heard too much for it to be only nine in the morning,” Kelley hits her friend’s arm lightly. “Is it cause she left, then?”

“Something like that,” Tobin sighs. 

Before Kelley can inquire further, there’s a knock at the door. 

“Must be Jackie!” Kelley says.

_oh my god. Jackie._

“We’re getting brunch, remember?” Kelley slowly clarifies when Tobin’s face stays clenched together in a blank expression, before registering that wasn’t the reason it was that way. “She’s fine, Tobs. I wingwomaned her to this football guy who came down to watch the games. Saw them leaving together, and I’m so ready to hear about it. You, on the other hand,” Kelley looks up and down her friend’s undressed existence and messy hair, “are not ready. Yeah, y’all were casual, but I’m not letting you be a jackass about it. Go put on some clothes and I’ll tell her you’re meeting us in the lobby in 10 minutes? Sound good?”

“Yeah,” Tobin breathes out as she runs a hand through her hair. “Thanks Kel.”

“Anytime Tobitio. The bros are back,” she grins at Tobin, before practically launching off the bed and through the door. 

As she hears voices diminishing away from the door and down the hallway, Tobin quickly rolls over and pulls out the sheet of thin white paper. 

**Hey T, I only had three left, but I figured you would need them over me, you big baby. Last night was fun. --C**

_Fun? What does that mean?_ Tobin doesn’t understand this girl. She never does, and the note gave literally no ounce of indication how Christen felt about the events that transpired the night before, or what they meant for the two of them.

Tobin pushes herself up to a sitting position, legs off the side of the bed, and takes a big breath, beginning to scan the room with her eyes. Christen’s clothes are gone, along with the navy USA hoodie that she had left on the desk chair the day before. She assumes that Christen took that with her. She strips off her t-shirt again, tossing it on the floor as she makes her way into the bathroom.

Stopping at the counter, she pauses to look up at her body, gasping at what she sees — a trail of red and purple spots down her neck, check, and stomach.

 _Thank god Kelley didn’t comment on those,_ she thinks to herself.

Grabbing her phone off the charger in the corner of the counter, she decides to send Christen a quick text to test the waters.

**9:01 a.m. Tobs: definitely not the baby here, but thanks for the advil**

She clicks her phone off before stepping into the hot shower water, the burning sensation reminding her of the way she had felt the night before when Christen had touched her. She lets the water wash over her, washing away the slight inclination that this really was just a _fun_ night for the girl, nothing more, attributing it to contemporary paranoia.

By the time she makes it to the lobby, it’s nearly half-past nine. Tobin walks up to the pair sitting at a set of two chairs in the corner of the first floor common area.

“Ugh finally, I could eat a horse right now.” Kelley groans, starting to skip toward the door immediately, calling out behind her, “Hurry up we only have an hour til the bus leaves!” 

Jackie hangs behind for a moment. “What’s up tiger?” she smiles and punches Tobin’s shoulder in anticipation.

Tobin just looks back at her with a smile. 

“I knew it!” Jackie yelled, before Tobin grabbed her and wrapped her arm around to cover her mouth. 

“Ok one, too loud you’re murdering my hungover head,” she says at normal volume, before continuing in a lower voice, almost at a whisper. “Two, I didn’t tell anyone else.”

Jackie just wiggles her way out of Tobin’s grasp and turns around, her brows furrowing. “Wait, where is she then? Is she not coming? I thought that’s why Kel was being so weird when she practically pushed me down the hallway.”

“Uh, no. I was just very naked. She wasn’t there this morning,” she says quietly as they start walking, before fishing the note out of her pocket and handing it to Jackie. 

Jackie’s face melts into one of sympathy. “This is weirdly vague. Is this it?” she flips it over to the back and back around the front.

“Yeah I texted her but she hasn’t responded,” she takes the piece of paper back from Jackie.

“Confusing.” Then Jackie starts laughing.

“What?”

“Nothing, I can see why you’re so into her.”

“Was that sarcasm?”

“Not at all, Tobs. You’re like the most competitive person I know, and she’s like a big fat game.”

Tobin smirks. “Thin, busty, likes a little choking action, game.”

“Ew, TMI Tobin!” Jackie shoves her hard, so that she stumbles a few feet sideways. 

“Whatever, and are you not gonna tell me about the football guy?”

Jackie just makes a widening gesture with her hands, leaving them about 10 inches apart, before smirking at Tobin.

“Oh my god, Jax, ew. But also, _score_?”

“You know it. I think we’re gonna hang out for real when we get back,” she's smiling widely.

Tobin smiles back. “That makes me so happy dude. Come by the soccer house next Friday -- we’re having a thing before winter break starts. Football will be there.”

“Ugh you’re the best,” she says, throwing her head back. 

They hear Kelley yelling from down the block, and Jackie just throws an arm around Tobin’s waist as they speed up the walk toward their destination. 

_______________________________________________________________

An hour later, they’re back on the bus, getting ready to head back to UNC. Tobin’s one of the last ones to get on the bus, so she’s surprised to see Christen’s usual seat is still empty.

Shrugging internally, she makes her way to her seat next to Kelley and plops down with an oomph.

“I’m so tired.”

“How can you be tired? I just watched you drink like seven cups of coffee,” her spiffy friend replies.

“Exactly,” Tobin laughs, stopping her speech when she sees Coach get on the bus and shut the door.

She looks down at her phone, confused, to see if Christen had answered. 

No response yet.

And then Coach is reading through their roster. 

“Morgan?”

“Here!”

“KO?”

“Ready to rumble, Coach.”

They pass Tobin’s name, too, eventually reading the letter “P.”

“Press?”

No reply.

“Press?”

Tobin looks over at her empty seat. _weird_

“Has anyone seen Press?”

But it’s the next thing she hears that sends her entire body into emotional overload. 

“She’s in safe hands, Coach” one of the sophomores says, prompting a bunch of giggles. 

Coach Doug just nods slowly. “Is she coming on the bus?”

The girl just shakes her head.

“Let’s hit the road then!”

“Don’t think that’s where she’s coming if you know what I mean,” Tobin then hears the sophomore girl whisper to another girl across the aisle.

Then the other is whispering back, “Yeah did you see them cozying up on the beach this morning, so cute!”

Tobin wants to punch something again.

As if she could sense Tobin’s anxiety at the moment, Kelley tentatively places a hand on her friend’s leg, a gesture of comfort.

And when Tobin looks up at her, she knows that Kelley heard it too.

She just smiles sympathetically before starting to speak. “Hey, um, a couple of us have been planning to stop in Georgia and stay on my family’s ranch until like, Tuesday night. We have one more seat in the car if you want to come…”

Tobin pauses for a moment.

On the one hand, she wasn’t sure if she and Kelley were ready that much consistent time together. And it was clearly a last minute, pity invite. On the other hand, there was nothing in the world she wanted less in this moment than to go back to school and see Christen and Brett together again. 

She could tolerate it before. But now that she knows what it’s like to have Christen. To taste her, to feel her skin on her own. Now that she knows what it’s like to have her, she can’t imagine being around Christen and _not_ being able to have her. 

Sounds like torture.

_what the hell_

“Count me in.”

“Awesome! My parents are away for the weekend, so it should be fun.”

“Just like old times.”

Kelley laughs. “Yeah, something like that.”

And that’s how Tobin finds herself saying goodbye to teammates, and stepping off of a bus on the side of a road in Peachtree City, Georgia. 

“I thought you said a couple of us,” she says to Kelley as she drops her duffle on the patch of grass on the side of the road, watching the bus drive away from just the two of them.

“Everyone else drove up in Ashlyn’s truck. You and me,” she pats Tobin on the shoulder before pointing down the rural road in front of them. “Are a five mile walk from the ranch.”

“You’re joking….”

“It’s private property, Tobs. The bus couldn’t go past this gate,” Kelley recounts as she slings her duffle over her shoulder and starts walking about ten feet before calling over her shoulder, “You coming?”

Tobin huffs and jogs to catch up with her friend. “I hate you.”

The duo spends the next two hours walking down the southern farm road, joking, laughing, catching up. Before this, the two never really had the time to recount everything they had missed in their two months apart, and while Tobin was originally a little nervous about this, she was more than happy and relieved by the time they were trudging up the steps of Kelley’s rural farm home. To be truthful, a month ago she wasn’t sure she would ever speak to Kelley again, let alone be walking into her house. So yeah, she’s sweating profusely under the hot southern sun, and she just walked five miles the morning after three consecutive days of playing full 90’s, but she’s certainly not complaining.

She’d been checking her phone periodically, waiting for Christen to respond, but not expecting her to. She knew better at this point.

Letting down her bags with a loud huff, she stands still for a moment on the front porch of the house, facing the door, her legs begging to collapse.

And they almost did when a body jumped onto her back, sending her tumbling forward until she hit the front door. Standing up, she feels warm hands cover her eyes. “Guess who!”

“Jackie! The hell are you doing here?”, she asks over her shoulder as the girl uncovers her eyes and holds onto her shoulders instead.

“Same thing as you Heath.”

“Were you just not gonna tell me?”

“I was hoping Kel would get her shit together and invite you.”

“Wow you’re just _always_ right,” Tobin drops, voice dripping in sarcasm as she kicks open the door and walks into the familiar house that smells of pine wood and citrus -- a uniquely O’Hara smell.

“Hey, you said it, not me,” Jackie replies, before Tobin turns around and drops her on the couch. “I snaked an invite at the club yesterday, which you would know if you hadn’t ditched me for the green-eyed goddess,” she sing-songs the end of her sentence.

“Dude shut up!”

“Tobin, you’re gonna have to tell Kelley eventually. Isn’t she over it anyway?”

“I don’t know, Jax.”

“She’s literally schmoozing all over Alex in the driveway. Pretty sure if you look close enough, you can actually see the drool.”

“What? Alex is here?” she says as she shuffles over to the window, using her fingers to spread the blinds and look out. Sure enough, there’s her California best friend in the driveway, touching Kelley’s arm and laughing. 

“Did everyone decide to just not tell me anything?” she mumbles loudly, registering Jackie’s laugh in the background as she runs out of the house and nearly catapults onto Alex again.

“Hiya Toby,” she laughs. “Ready to bool?”

Tobin pulls back. “Hell yeah, please get my mind off last night.”

Both Kelley and Alex stare at her with arched eyebrows.

“You’re gonna have to get more drinks in me first.”

“To the truck!” Kelley yells, which leads to the piling of six girls into the bed of a two-door Ford F-150, cruising down the rural roads to the closest liquor store, and leaving with enough beer to satiate a large family — which, more or less, they were.

For the next few days, they spent time together at Kelley’s house. They caught up on schoolwork, went swimming, drank on the back porch, and really just celebrated the end of a successful season. The girls all got to know Alex better, and she seemed to fit right in.

On Tuesday night, they made another alcohol run, before stopping back at the house to grab chairs, as well as matches and kindling for a fire. They were headed out to a lake, arriving just at the tail-end of sunset. 

Tobin sat with her legs dangling off of the back of the truck bed, on one side of the circle of chairs encapsulating a raging fire in the center of them all. 

“Can you believe we only have one season left?” Ashlyn says breathlessly, having just jogged over from the truck and plopping herself down nearly on top of Ali on a lawn chair.

“Can you believe Tobs has only been here for five months?” Ali says next, and they all laugh at that, feeling like they’d known her for so much longer.

“Can you believe I didn’t talk to Tobin for over two of those months?”

Tobin just throws her near-empty water bottle across the fire at her friend, yelling “Yeah, not cool dude.”

“It’s not like I didn’t keep tabs on you during that time!”

“Oh did you now?”

“Yes,” Kelley states, “You stole my favorite spot on campus, it was hard to _not_ know where you were.”

“Well technically we found the 180 together the summer before freshman year, making it both of ours, sooo…” she trails off.

“What’s the 180?” Alex butts into the conversation.

“You remember that big flat rock in the air that I told you about, Al?” Tobin states.

“Oh! The one you jumped off naked?”

A unison of “WHAT?!” escape the mouth of her friends as they sit up around the circle.

Tobin just looks incredulously at Alex, who rolls her eyes and looks over at Jackie, prompting a whole new wave of chorused questions.

Tobin just groans.

The blonde girl threw her head back laughing for a moment before centering again and letting out with a chuckle, “A few weeks ago, Tob came to hangout with some of my friends in our off-campus apartment. It was right after practice, and I wasn’t back from campus yet, so she let herself in with the spare key we hid outside to take a shower. The doorbell rang because we ordered pizza, so she hopped out of the shower, couldn’t find a towel, so she just tiptoed to the door since no one else was home. But when she reached out to grab the pizza,” and now Jackie is barely able to speak she’s laughing so hard, and Tobin is hiding her head in her hands, shaking it at herself. “She tripped and fell into the hallway naked. The door shut behind her and the key was inside, so she couldn’t get back in.”

Then Alex cuts in. “Luckily she had her phone, so she called me freaking out, right? And then she heard people — the look on her face was priceless — and she starts running out of the building down the back stairs and she’s flipping out outside in the dark. So I was like ‘Do you still keep your room key in the back of your phone case,’ and she was like ‘omg yeah’ and hung up on me to start heading back toward campus.”

“Why didn’t you just call Jackie?” Morgan laughs out.

“It was embarrassing!” Tobin jousts back.

Jackie continues the story, chucking. “The engineering quad is on the way back to the dorms, but as she’s walking through she sees a crowd of people in front of her, and then there are people behind her coming out of the Mechanical Engineering Building. So of course, her only option is to climb up on the 180 in the middle of the quad, and lay flat up there so no one could see her as they passed.”

“Hey I, for one, thought it was fucking genius idea,” Tobin interjects with a smile.

Alex rolls her eyes. “Whatever, so she calls me back to fill me in on said ‘genius idea’ but then a few minutes later I see her face practically go white.”

“What happened?” Ali asks.

Jackie gestures across the circle at Kelley. “Little miss ‘this-is-my-rock’ was coming to chill at the rock.”

“So Tobs is freaking out because her and Kelley aren’t in kahoots,” Alex continues, “And all I heard was a series of ‘I can do it’ before I see naked Tobin flying through the air off of the 15 foot rock on facetime.”

“Wait, how in the hell did I not see you?” Kelley asks.

Tobin turns to her friends and huffs in embarrassment. “That’s why I jumped, dude. I couldn’t climb down the back because that’s where you were approaching.”

“Anyway, that was my intro to the 180,” Alex laughs. 

“Oh my god I can’t believe I missed this,” Kelley starts laughing too.

And then they’re all laughing, as Tobin finishes the rest of the story, recounting how she had to dive into a bush in the dark to avoid half of the men’s cross-country team as they were walking back from practice, and how she finally made it.

Ashlyn jumps in about the last time she got caught naked outside of the soccer house, and soon they settle into lively conversation.

Eventually, though, Tobin had started to zone out. To her, this felt like a breath of fresh air. One she realized she hadn’t gotten at all since any of this started with Christen, or with Kelley this fall. Her friends were laughing and talking around the fire, and it all felt so normal… 

As if the past few months hadn’t happened.

As if her mind weren’t plastered to her phone, waiting for that single notification that hadn’t come through all day.

As if she wasn’t actively avoiding the whole Christen thing entirely. 

It seemed like an eternity had passed in what had only been a few minutes of Tobin staring at the sun setting over the horizon on the lake. Watching the unwavering, fiery orb of light descend, the blue water reflected a vibrant green, and those eyes flashed back into her mind. Their allure was enticing, almost mesmerizing. And sitting here, in the face of abiding and imperishable beauty, she lost connection between the skyline and those green eyes, and she felt herself slipping, her mind wandering, a single tear falling. 

She was happy with what happened with the girl four nights ago, but _God_ she wanted more.

The sunset was akin to Christen — it’s value unfathomable and its power inestimable. A series of fleeting moments of golden sunset; a prolonging chance to reevaluate what she wanted to do about this. The loud silence is so comfortable, so familiar. Tobin had been living in the loud silence with Christen. 

She didn’t stop watching until the fiery orb had vanished, and all that was left was Tobin herself and what seemed like a dark abyss in the middle of a Georgia winter. 

Registering an arm coming around her shoulder and another body hopping up on the truck bed, she snaps out of it and quickly wipes her tear away, before seeing that her other friends had gone down to the water.

“Whatcha thinkin about?” she hears Kelley ask.

Tobin just takes another sip of beer, before taking her phone out and powering it down. 

“I lied this morning.”

“About what?”

“I left the club with someone last night.”

“Yeah,” Kelley laughs. “We went over that.”

“I left with her.”

“Who— _oh_.”

Tobin let’s out a breath. “I’ll leave if you want.”

Kelley just grabs her arm. “No, no it’s, um… it’s okay.”

“It’s not, though, Kel.”

“Oh, she left with him,” Kelley says more to explain it to herself than actually to Tobin.

“Yeah, she did.”

They sit in silence for a moment.

“Well I have a confession too.”

Tobin looks up curiously.

“I left with Alex.”

Tobin’s jaw drops happily and she slaps her arm. “I knew it!”

“You’re not mad?”

“Hell no,” she says as she scoots back and lays flat on her back on the truck bed. She moves the bottle up toward her mouth and tilts it up to the sky to take a big swig. 

Kelley lays down next to her, just staring at the stars in the sky for a few minutes as the sound of their friends laughing plays in the background.

“What’s the plan?”

“I don’t know dude. I’m just so done.”

“Tobin have you even talked to her?”

“I don’t usually talk to girls after one-night things. Why start now?”

“Oh sure, because Christen is just another girl,” Kelley quips sarcastically.

“She might as well be at this point, Kel.” 

Her friend just stares at her incredulously, so Tobin keeps talking.

“How many times does she need to reject me before I accept it? I feel like I’m just wasting my time.”

“Since when is fucking someone rejecting them?”

“Are _you_ , of all people, asking me that about Christen Press?”

“Okay, okay...fine. Maybe I’m not one to talk, but how are you supposed to know that it didn’t mean more if you don’t ask?”

Tobin just laughs in response. “Yeah because that worked out so well for you.”

Kelley rolls her eyes and drinks her beer. “Touchê.”

“That’s the difference, though, Tobin. I did actually ask.” Kelley continues. 

“I think I’ll be happier without the hard rejection.”

“Because ignoring her is gonna be so much better for you?” Kelley continues.

“I texted her. It’s not like she’s texted me back in the past four days.”

“You’re in fucking Georgia.”

“So?”

“This is like max avoidance.”

“She was gone when I woke up, and she left Florida with him, Kelley. No word.”

“Are you gonna let it stay that way?”

“I need another drink,” Tobin says in lieu of a response, as she brings one arm up behind her head.

Kelley concedes, whipping out a handle of vodka from behind the tarp on the truck bed. “Say less.”

And the two of them stay up there on the truck bed, drinking and talking for another hour or so. No more about the green-eyed girl. Tobin has had enough of that for the night and for the weekend, honestly. So they chat about soccer, about coming to UNC, about memories long forgotten, until the handle is completely empty. 

At this point, Tobin’s well past tipsy, and it’s well past the hour of good decisions.

“I’m gonna head back,” Tobin slurs.

“I’ll come with.”

She stops Kelley with a hand on the chest. “Stay and hang with Alex. I was gonna grab Jax anyway.”

“ _Tobin._ ”

“Don’t.”

“Are you sure that’s —”

“You, of all people, know exactly how I feel. Let me deal.”

“Okay fine,” Kelley relents. She knew how Tobin _dealt_ with heartbreak.

“Jackie!” Tobin yells, cupping her hands around her mouth as she does so. As soon as she sees the girl’s head turn, walking away from the others and coming up the dock, she hops off the trunk and turns to her friend. “See you back at the house?”

“Yeah, see you,” Kelley returns quietly.

And then Tobin is setting off toward the house half-draping her weight over Jackie’s just-tipsy body.

And when they get back, Jackie is trying to dump the drunk girl in bed.

And Tobin sees the surprise in her eyes when she pulls the blonde girl on top of her.

And Jackie’s hesitant, because she _knows_ why Tobin is being like this.

And she eventually gives in, because she can see the hurt in Tobin’s eyes. 

And Tobin’s too heartbroken and drunk to care about anything else anyway.

And when she wakes up in the morning, there’s relief, but there’s something else too. A twang of regret, maybe. Some guilt, too. 

Then again, it’s not like she should feel guilty. Her and Christen aren’t actually a thing. She knows she shouldn’t be avoiding her, but at this point, she’d rather love her from a distance than get metaphorically punched in the gut again, for like the fifth time.

_______________________________________________________________

The road trip back was a time and a half. One would think that with the amount of energy that had expended over the past four days in Georgia, they would have been rightfully worn out for the ride home. 

That wasn’t the case. 

7 hours of pure, unbridled fun.

6 people stuffed into a small sudan. 

5 empty bags of Skinny Pop on the floor. 

4 aggressively loud renditions of Hello by Adele. 

3 stops for gas.

2 best friends, renewed.

1 very calm Tobin.

They had left pretty late in the day, and at about 9 p.m., Ashlyn had been whining so loud about getting food that Kelley finally gave in and pulled into the parking lot of her favorite pizza place just an hour outside of Chapel Hill, the one that her friends had heard about non-stop, but none of them had ever been to. 

“This is so far out of the way.” Ashlyn whines, peering out the window.

“Yeah, Kel,” Tobin turns to her friend, “how did you even find this place?”

“Uh, a friend showed me it,” Kelley replies vaguely, before shifting the gear into park and opening the door. Turning around she faces all her friends and lifts her hand to point at each of them as she says, “Tobin and Ash - pepperoni, Ali and Morgan - margherita, Jax, you and I are the only ones with a sense of taste - hawaiian. Correct?”

“Never gonna be correct about hawaiian bro, gross,” Tobin states bluntly, her face scrunching up in feigned disgust. 

Kelley throws her keys hard at Tobin, who is sitting shotgun. “I will forget your pizza, don’t test me.”

“Whatever” she mumble-laughs, realizing she won’t win this one. She wants pizza, and Kelley doesn’t actually joke about food. 

The remaining five girls are just sitting in the car talking, when they’re startled by Kelley running -- practically sprinting -- out of the pizza establishment, launching herself into the car and throwing pizza boxes at everyone, who start digging in immediately, oblivious to Kelley’s strange, rushed behavior. 

“Gimme the keys, Tobs,” she sticks her hand out.

“Did you like, steal these pizzas or something?” Tobin asks, laughing at Kelley’s chaotic energy.

“No, what? Of course not. Give the keys,” she shakes her already outstretched hand.

Tobin is about to give them over, when she hears a familiar laugh ring through the car window, and her hand freezes. 

And she sees Kelley close her eyes, as if she’s cursing at herself.

Swivelling her head around, they reveal themselves — Christen and Brett, that is — leaning up against the side of his black SUV, laughing and eating pizza.

She turns back toward Kelley, holding her hand up so that her thumb points out the window and toward the pair. “Let me guess, that’s the friend?”

“Yeah,” her face melts into one of sympathy. “I’m sorry, the pizza is just _so_ good.”

“It’s fine, pull up.”

“What?”

“You’re the one that said I should talk to her. So pull up.”

“To the both of them?”

“Are you not curious what she’s gonna say?”

“Good point, your wish is my command.”

The other girls are still walking amongst themselves across the backseat of the truck as Kelley starts the car and drives up next to the Black SUV.

Tobin rolls down the window.

“Hey Chris.”

She sees the girl stop laughing and make some sort of strange eye contact with Brett that she just can’t place, before he walks away and she’s turning toward the car.

Christen takes a deep breath before stepping forward and leaning her arms down on the windowsill, smiling and staring into Tobin’s eyes. “Hi Tobs.”

“Funny seeing you here,” Tobin says calmly. “Haven’t seen you since Saturday morning. Oh, wait, no, Friday night. _My bad_.”

Christen’s brow furrows as she registers the sharpness of Tobin’s tone. 

“Uh, yeah.” She pauses. “I’m so glad I ran into you, I needed to tell you —” 

And then she watches as Christen registers all of the other eyes on her, including Kelley’s, and she watches as the girl visibly tenses up, pushing herself into a standing position. 

“Tell me what?” she prompts her to continue.

Tobin just holds eye contact with her once again as she takes a bite of her pizza. 

Christen doesn’t respond right away. 

So Tobin turns to hand Kelley her slice of pizza, before clicking her seatbelt unbuckled and stepping out of the truck, landing on both feet with a loud thump against the worn pavement. She takes a step toward Christen, and asks her again, quietly, out of earshot of her friends in the car. 

“You needed to tell me what, Chris?”

Christen just looks toward the truck window, where several sets of eyes are watching them. 

“Um, it can wait,” Christen says as she looks down at her feet.

Tobin takes a step closer to her, and Christen takes a quick step back.

“Chris, come _on._ ”

They enter another long, loaded stare, and it reminds her of the one they shared that night in the club bathroom. The moment before Christen said she wanted her. Before she felt the touch that ignited a fire deep within Tobin. But Tobin could feel at this particular moment that the ending would be different.

And she could tell Christen wasn’t going to say anything else right now. How surprising. 

“Are you gonna be in the dorm tonight?” Tobin asks instead.

“Probably not,” Christen whispers.

And Tobin wholly laughs under breath. 

“Ok, whatever. I’ll see you tomorrow, then?” 

_I can at least be her friend now or something._

“Sounds good.”

Tobin turns toward the Truck and steps forward to open the passenger-side door. “Hope you guys have a good night,” she says in a firm but despondent tone.

And then she’s shutting the door, and when Kelley sees her face, she is immediately hitting the gas pedal and starting a conversation about something else. To say Tobin appreciates Kelley right now would be an understatement.

What she misses is the way Christen stands there for a minute after the truck pulls out of the parking lot.

Or the way Brett comes up to her and asks her why she didn’t tell her. 

Or the way Christen sheds an angry, frustrated tear.

Or the way Christen asks him to drop her off at the dorm tonight instead. 

She’ll see it soon, though.

_______________________________________________________________

“Let’s go shorty, I’m tired,” Tobin calls out at Jackie as she’s stepping through the soccer house door. 

“You better not be,” Jackie smirks as she comes up behind her and jumps on her back. “Need you awake tonight.”

“Oh really?”

“Mhm,” Jackie kisses her neck once. 

“I’m gonna introduce you to my sisters later on facetime, remember?”

“And that’s the only reason why? May as well just take a nap now.”

Jackie just saps the back of her head lightly and laughs. 

“I have other plans for you, Heath.”

The farther they get across campus, the more frequent the neck kisses get, and the more bite there is to them.

Tobin had filled Jackie in on the parking lot chat at the soccer house that evening. Filled her in on the way that Christen had basically said she was going home with him. Filled her in on the way seemingly nothing had changed at all. And Jackie just suggested they go get her mind off of everything. That they go have fun in her dorm room anyway, since they at least know Christen isn’t going to be there anyway. Kind of like a last hurrah before they have to return to reality for the last few days of school that were to resume the following morning. 

The other girls had all decided to sleep over the soccer house, so it was just Jackie and Tobin leaving. And she had to admit, the girl was definitely helping get her mind off of things. 

They’re finally making their way down the dorm hallway, lips attached. And Tobin is removing her hands from Jackie’s body just long enough to grab her key and unlock the dorm door.

The blonde girl is giggling as Tobin’s arms encircle her waist and swing her through the door. 

It takes Tobin a few more moments to register the lights are on in the room already, and a few more moments after that before she opens her own eyes and removes her lips from Jackie’s to look up.

There, sitting on Tobin’s bed, is Christen, eyes wide, looking as if she’s about to spontaneously combust.

“Why’d you stop?” Jackie’s laughing and turning around, breathing out a “Shit” as she sees the girl on Tobin’s bed, her smile immediately dropping off her face.

Then Tobin is lowering her hands from Jackie’s body. 

She clears her throat. “Uh, thought you weren’t coming back tonight?” she directs at Christen.

Christen herself was just staring at her softly, with eyes that were just puffy enough that Tobin could tell she had been crying. There’s pain on her face, and Tobin is wondering why. 

And then Tobin watches, able to see the way Christen drains the emotion from her face and puts up her stone wall, right there in front of her. The way she can put up such a facade to hide how she really feels. 

“Well clearly I did,” she snaps, before closing her eyes for a long moment, and openint them again to continue in a calmer voice. “Sorry I shouldn’t have just stopped by. I’ll go.”

“This is literally your room, Chris, it’s fine. Did you want to actually talk now?”

She feels Jackie squeeze her arm at the hopeful sentiment that fills her voice. Or maybe it’s for support. Either is well-appreciated at this moment.

“It’s fine. I’m just gonna go.”

There she goes, deflecting again, closing herself off, slipping away in front of Tobin’s very eyes.

“Wait, let’s talk,” Tobin lets out, not even bothering to hide the desperation in her voice. She steps forward away from Jackie, who steps back toward the door at the same time to give them as much space as possible, but not wanting to leave Tobin entirely on her own. 

Christen hops off of the bed and starts to walk around it, before Tobin steps in front of her, effectively blocking her path. “Talk to me.”

“Are you just gonna leave your guest hanging?” she gestures at Jackie before poking Tobin hard in the chest — hard enough to make her stumble a step backwards — and saying in a sarcastic yet joking manner, “How fucking rude of you. Then again, guess you can’t be polite to _all_ of them, it’d run you dry,” Christen throws her hands into the air in frustration, exaggerating her statements with her action.

“Okay one, don’t be rude to my friend. Two, all of who? What are you talking about?”

“I should’ve known better,” she mutters under her breath, but it’s loud enough for Tobin to hear. “I broke up with him for you,” she says louder, with pain in her voice, a tear falling from her eye again. “Oh god,” she lets out, a hand slapping over her own mouth.

“You what?” Tobin says in a mild state of shock, not sure if she heard the girl correctly.

“I — nothing. Nothing. I’m leaving.”

Tobin’s had enough. “Will you just fucking talk to me for once?” she yells a little louder than necessary. She’s just frustrated and all of her emotions seem to be hitting the goddamn wall at once. 

She’s sick of the silence. 

Sick of the give and take. 

Sick of the unanswered questions.

Christen takes a shaky breath, and then she’s pushing past Tobin and Jackie, shaking her head, running out into the hallway. And Tobin is left standing behind, confused at even what just happened. So, she says as much.

“What just happened?” she turned around, asking Jackie.

Jackie’s looking at her like she just said the dumbest thing on the planet.

“Are you gonna go after her?”

“Why should I always have to?”

“Because you want her,” Jackie says sincerely, with a small smile.

Tobin pauses for a moment before responding. “I’ve always wanted her. She’s the one who runs.”

The blonde girl just rolls her eyes at Tobin’s idiocy in this particular moment.

“Tobin, she broke up with her boyfriend for you, and you walked in with your tongue down my throat,” she states plainly.

Jackie opens her mouth and nods as she sees realization flash through Tobin’s hazel eyes. And then Tobin’s cursing “ _shit_ ” under her breath and running toward the door. 

She pauses with her hand on the door, looking back. “Wait, I was supposed to meet your sisters on facetime, I can stay.”

Jackie just scoffs in disbelief. “Yeah, over my dead body you’re staying. I’m gonna go back to Kelley’s. Go find her you nutcase.”

Tobin nods quickly in a gesture of thanks before taking off down the hallway toward the stairs.

“For the first time ever, I’m hoping to god I get friendzoned by you tomorrow,” she hears Jackie yell from behind her. “Don’t think this means you get out of meeting my sisters though!”

Tobin’s laughing for a moment, feeling incredibly grateful for Jackie’s support in … well, everything lately. “Deal!”, she calls out as she enters the stairwell. 

She’s jumping down stairs two-to-three at a time, just trying to get out of the building as quick as possible. 

And for a moment her mind wanders from the task at hand. Because it’s almost like that first night -- the one where Christen ran out of their room with a huff and tears rolling down her cheeks.

_Almost._

This time, Tobin’s going after her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (It’s me, I’m the girl who jumped naked off of a 15 foot rock one night on campus last year after going outside to get a pizza box. Shhhh.)


End file.
